Are you a food person?

October 31, 2008 at 5:29 pm (food, Picture, Posted by Cindy, Uncategorized)
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I’ve mentioned before that my motto in life is…Fattie: It’s not a size, it’s a lifestyle. (Subtext: It’s my lifestyle.) I see fattie-dom as embracing life (and food) with vigor, and I try to lead my life with as much vigor sans physical exertion as possible. (The one exception is that I’m a fast walker.) I love to eat. I’m not a gourmand and I don’t pretend to be a good cook (I’m a much better baker), but I do try to incorporate nice things into my diet and utilize the techniques I observed when I eschewed normal-people TV for three years and only watched Food Network. Nice? Read: fresh produce and potent spices.

Another mobile phone picture I wanted to share involved some not-so-fresh ingredients, though. (Don’t judge!) My former roommate, Christina, had some turkey dogs that were about to expire. Despite my assurances that they put so many nitrates in there it would be difficult for them to actually expire, she was worried (and much more conscious than I), so I agreed to help her use them up while she was busy writing a paper. Luckily, her housemate had some rice leftover from the day before. Let me tell you–slightly old (cooked) rice is spectacular for fried rice! I learned how to fry rice from my mother, although she is usually not in charge of this dish at home. My dad is, because they do share cooking duties, and fried rice is something he can handle. (Especially because Jon wouldn’t let them put anything besides eggs in there–not even green onion–so it was extra simple!)

Ingredients (for this particular iteration; this really is a kitchen sink dish)

  • Refrigerated cooked rice-break it up with a fork or a pair of chopsticks so that there are no clumps; good fresh rice is a little moist, whereas rice that’s prime for frying is a little bit drier
  • Cherry tomatoes, halved or quartered
  • Black bean in garlic chili paste
  • Turkey dogs, chopped up
  • Eggs

Protocol

  1. Drizzle some oil in the pan, then scoop about a tablespoon of the black bean paste; push it around a bit so that it’s runnier and less gooey.
  2. Saute the turkey dogs in the black bean paste; remove from pan and set aside.
  3. Scramble eggs in the now-seasoned pan, but leave them slightly wet; remove from pan and set aside.
  4. Add a bit more oil to the pan, then dump in the rice. Use a saute-ing motion with the spatula to make sure every rice kernel get heated up and coated in oil. Add the turkey dogs back in, fry a bit, and put in the eggs and tomatoes. Toss everything together a bit and serve.

I know you want a picture!

This is yet another photo taken with my camera phone.

Now, some explanation.  Usually, fried rice is made with soy sauce, but when there isn’t any available, you need another sodium source, which is why I used the black bean in garlic chili paste.  (There was some soy sauce in there.)  Here is my “usual” recipe, using ingredients I typically have at home.

Ingredients

  • 2-day old rice
  • eggs beaten with a dash of salt
  • chopped onion (and/or other aromatics, such as scallions, garlic, shallots, &c.)
  • protein (cubed ham, turkey dogs, I don’t put tofu in fried rice, but you can!)
  • frozen corn (and/or other veggies)
  • cooking oil (usually vegetable or olive oil)
  • sesame oil
  • soy sauce

Protocol

  1. Heat some oil in a wide-ish pan that’s at least 2 inches high (a wok is ideal)
  2. Throw in the onions; saute until just starting to caramelize (the done-ness is a matter of taste).  If you have meat (chopped deli meat is fine!), you can also cook it now.
  3. Remove the onions; then scramble the eggs in the same oil.  When still slightly moist, remove from pan.
  4. Add more oil to the pan and toss in the rice.  As it starts to fry, drizzle a bit of soy sauce around the edges, then push the rice around.  A splash of sesame oil goes a long way to add delicious aroma, too!  Then, throw in the eggs, onions, and veggies, make sure the veggies are cooked/warmed through, and serve.

I’m baking a cocoa chai cake right now, though, so I’ll just end here.  So.  Delicious.  HAPPY HALLOWEEN!  (Pictures to come.)

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Some visuals

October 31, 2008 at 12:35 am (Picture, Posted by Cindy)
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I’ve got two types of visuals for y’all.  (a) a screen shot, and (b) two mobile phone pictures.

(a) The last post was number 88.  Pretty cool, right?  This is auspicious in Chinese-speaking communities because the number eight sounds like the word for prosper.  Check it.

(b) This past weekend, I decided to paint my nails, something that doesn’t happen very often.  Since it was Halloween, I thought I should be festive.  Unfortunately, the nail polish combination I chose didn’t turn out as orange as I would have liked.  (I wasn’t going for a bright orange; more like and orange-y amber with jewel overtones.  Or something.)  Clearly, the situation could be improved by glitter.  Clearly, I only have nail polish from years ago.  At any rate, I took pictures of my hand and my nail so that the world at large could appreciate the “childish” glitter, as Michelle pointed out.  I guess it’s a little middle school to have glittery nail polish…but maybe my friends are just as judgmental as I am!  My fine motor skills have not been honed in the area of nail polish, so the first day I paint my nails, the surrounding skin is often dabbed with color, as well.  My nails always look good a day or two later, after the skin has been denuded of polish, but before the nails start chipping.  Et, voila…

So maybe I’m not going to be a hand model.  Also, my nails are kind of short.  Not in the sense that they were recently clipped (though they were), but that well…the nail bed isn’t very…deep?  I’m not sure how to describe it.

And, a close-up.  Picture taken with the Samsung A737 mobile phone camera against a backdrop of…my couch.  For those who care, here is a description of the polish I used (I don’t know specific names, and the bottles aren’t near me right now):

  1. GAP white
  2. dot of Lancome reddish-pinkish, then mixed/spread with
  3. Wet ‘n Wild terra cotta [It’s kind of ugly.  It was a present and unfortunately, not very well-suited to me]
  4. Shattered [I don’t know if that’s a brand; it’s silver dot glitter and blue bar glitter–kind of like describing bacterial shapes!  Ha.  I’m such a nerd!]
  5. clear top coat

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Goals!

October 30, 2008 at 8:49 pm (College, Life, Posted by Cindy)
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Alright, so here it is.  Tuesday, November 4, 2008 is a very important day!  Yes, there’s the little thing those in the biz like to call the Election.  But more importantly, it will be Varsha’s and my Blogiversary!  No, that doesn’t utilize the proper Latin, but I’m not a classicist, am I?

Because I took a statistics midterm today, I’m thinking in equations.  So, here are a couple for consideration.

Goal: 100 posts by 1 year
Current number of posts: 87 (88 after this one…an auspicious number!)
Number of posts needed to achieve goal: 100 – 88 = 12

Deadline: Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Current date: Thursday, October 30, 2008
Days before deadline: 1 day in Oct. + 4 days (I’m giving myself all of Tuesday) in Nov. = 5 days

Posts per day: 12 ÷ 5 = 2 2/5 (fractions are so much better than decimals)

Can we do it?  Yes!  Especially because I have several more picture posts all lined up and ready to go!  Hurray 😀  Incidentally, I’m making friends in the blogging world and want to give some shout-outs to Jen, Korie, Jenna, and Diane!

Several things may stand in my way, although only one of them will be before Tuesday.  On Monday, I have a lab practical.  On Thursday, I have a genetics exam.  On Friday, I have a microbiology exam.  On Saturday, I’m taking the GRE in Biology.  Surely I ought to study for some of these.  Of course, there is also Halloween tomorrow (I’m going to be a GFP bunny!), the football game this weekend (in the rain!), and responding to the professors who’ve been talking to me about grad school.

Thank goodness for baked goods.

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Campus Renovations

October 27, 2008 at 11:23 pm (College, Picture, Posted by Cindy, Technology)
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The state of California has no money.  This should come as no surprise to Americans, given the sad state of the economy these days, but we kind of haven’t had money for a long time.  My perspective is that of a student at a public university; I sometimes grow wistful when I hear tell of my friends at private schools and the economic benefits thereof.  But, that is neither here nor there, and I’ve had a great experience at Cal.  Besides, plenty of college students are broke, right?  I did talk to my parents last night about finances.  My mother does not believe this topic to be a matter of public consumption, and I think I agree–with the exception of college, and possibly post-college life.  College students who do have money to spread around tend to be spreading the largesse of their parents (yes, massive generalization), and post-college, there are even fewer people living off their family, leading to a higher incidence of financial straits.  I think.  We’ll see.

At any rate, there are a lot of renovations going on around campus, and I’m not sure where all the money originated to fund these projects.  The stadium, for instance, has already cost an exorbitant sum based on legal fees alone!  I will voice my opinion here briefly, as I keep referencing the controversy obliquely without expounding.  This is a news release from 2005 (my first semester as a Golden Bear) announcing the project plan–boy, did things go awry.  Various groups opposed development; some are just against development in general; others spoke out against the destruction of an oak grove at the project site.  Here’s my take.  The construction is necessary and not uni-purpose (i.e., focused only on the football team).  I’ve seen the field hockey team change at the side of the field, facing the street, because they don’t have their own locker room.  In addition, a famous stop on the tour of Memorial Stadium involves visiting the fault line.  The Hayward Fault Line is the most dangerous in America (I won’t cite any studies on this because I’m running late, but Mik recently told me so, and she is a credible source.  Gold star for anyone who can name the possible logical fallacy in my argument here.), and you can see an actual rift in our bleachers, right under one of the alumni sections.  It would be a tragic way to go.  Second, trees are important, but the trees in question were not…well…polar bears.  They were planted when the stadium was built, so they did not pre-date UC construction.  Furthermore, the proposal indicated that three trees would be planted for every tree cut down.  (Again, my credible source is a friend–an Architecture major.)  Lastly, protests are important; civil disobedience is important.  The caveat, of course, is that causes should be worthwhile.  If there were people willing to go so far as to sit in trees for 21 months, they surely had energy to um…solve world hunger, or cure cancer.  It is my opinion that their passion was wasted on trivia, and they in turn wasted resources the university could have used on ME!  The arguments I’ve presented here have been tossed around ad nauseum by others and are not novel in the least.  I’m simply typing them out here because I should finally explain the past references.

This brings me to my actual purpose.  Another iconic Berkeley monument is undergoing renovation, and this time, I do know where the money originated!  The class of 1950 helped raise funds to give Sather Gate a facelift.  That press release explains many of the reasons why Sather Gate is so special; I should also point out that it is one of the scenes that was actually filmed on our campus in The Graduate, which I have yet to see.  That’s another half-post in itself, though.  I took a couple pictures on the mobile and sent them to my email from my phone (!), which isn’t particularly advanced for anyone else, but is a huge step on my part in embracing technology, ok?

This one is the day before construction began:

And this is the first day of construction (aww…):

Not bad, huh?

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Reach

October 22, 2008 at 12:37 am (College, Posted by Cindy)
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Most grad school applications are due in December.  Let’s hearken back to some high school terminology and discuss reach schools, shall we?  I kind of kicked booty in high school (Varsha even more so!  Hi, Varsh!), the state of California kind of liked me, and I kind of knew that I’d get into college.  I didn’t really know my “range,” didn’t have any expectations of where I would get in, and therefore didn’t set any “reach schools.”  Well, I certainly have not kicked booty in college and now have the sense that all schools are reach schools for me.

Of all the criteria that grad schools are said to be looking for (statement of purpose, GPA, letters of recommendation, GRE scores), I’m most worried about my grade-point average.  My spirits lifted temporarily when I was told that schools would look more at my research experience (hurray for Peggy!) and letters (again, hurray for Peggy!), and I was particularly excited at the response I got when I started emailing professors at different schools, asking about the programs.  Well, this morning, I spoke with a professor at MIT, and he was very nice and helpful, but when I mentioned my GPA (and the actual, low, LOW number), he said, “Er, well, I strongly encourage you to apply to multiple programs if you’d really like to study at MIT.”  He had been encouraging me to apply to multiple programs anyway, so that’s not completely discouraging, but I’m once again feeling as though I won’t get into grad school.

I’m left feeling like all schools are reach schools.  We’re about to see just how long my arm is.

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No Apologies

October 19, 2008 at 2:10 pm (Posted by Cindy)
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Many bloggers these days are prefacing their posts with, “I’m sorry for bringing up politics…”  On the other hand, there are entire blogs devoted to politics.  I am not nearly knowledgeable enough to speak only of politics (but this blog is YOUR blog, so you may guest post if you’d like!), but neither will I apologize for using this platform to support the candidates, propositions, and ideals of my choosing.

*Caveat emptor: There are those who will chalk this post up to the liberal Bay Area propagandists, but I’ll point out that I grew up in a “red state,” and while I am the child of immigrants, they aren’t traditionally liberal, either.

The presidential candidates and their running-mates have been hashed and re-hashed (no drug references, please), so this is just a brief support, qualification, or condemnation:

  • Barack Obama: Yes, he can.  YES, WE WILL.
  • Joe Biden: Kind of an “expected” politico who hearkens back to the founding fathers.  I’m not anti-Old White Man (I love George Clooney and Anderson Cooper too much for that), but he does fit that mold of D.C.
  • John McCain: The OWM of all OWMs.  Not really, but he is older than Alaska, home to his running-mate.  Would be good to me, because he likes women named Cindy.  And, speaking of his running-mate…
  • Sarah Palin: It is insulting to assume that she’d represent me simply because she is a woman, and I am a woman.  She’s supposed to warm the cockles of American hearts, but you know what?  I don’t look like her.  I don’t speak like her.  I don’t wink like her.  You might argue that her vagine is my vagine, and therefore we are kinswomen, but you know what?  My vagine has not brought forth 5 children.  We are vagine proprietors, but we certainly are not vagine sisters.

I will vote for Jerry McNerney for Congress.

I will vote for Jennifer Hosterman for the mayor of Pleasanton.

Propositions!  Some high-profile; others, unknown.  Here we go!

  • Bond Measure Prop 1A: High-Speed Rail.  We don’t have money to pay for this right now, but it’s not as though the State of California produces a timely budget anyway.  I’m voting YES for HSR, because someday, we will be able to pay for it, and we should start planning for it now.  On other continents, they hop/skip into other countries.  If I could pay for gas, I could hop in my parents’ car, drive for 8 hours, and still be in California.  Clearly, we need more efficient public transportation.
  • Initiative Statue Prop 2: Farm Animals.  I’m voting NO.  My biases: my maternal grandparents own a chicken farm (for eggs, not for poultry) in Taiwan; I worry how the Californian economy will further suffer if farmers are held to (I won’t say “higher”) this new standard.  My rationale: First of all, most Californian livestock regulations already conform to what the proponents of 2 demand.  The largest impact would be on chicken farmers, and I don’t believe that the new regulations would create a better product from them.  “Free-range” chickens are often only “free-range” and un-penned because their wings are clipped.  That is no way to live.  Moreover, I have seen humane (yet caged) treatment of chickens firsthand.  These “standards” are an unfortunate anthropomorphic interpretation of chickenhood.  Second of all (yes, second.  I don’t only put money before humanity.), I cannot afford to pay $3 for an egg, or–more extremely–not be able to find Californian eggs at all.  Many farmers would be put out of business by Prop 2; we would only be increasing our carbon footprint if we imported eggs from other states.
  • Initiative Statute Prop 3: This needs further research.  To be continued…
  • Initiative Constitutional Amendment Prop 4: Parental Notification for teenaged abortists.  Uh-oh.  Watch out for the liberal propaganda!  It is unfortunate that there exist teenagers who feel compelled to seek abortions.  (Clearly, they are just not as honorable as Bristol Palin, who is honorably keeping her future of Alaska and marrying her baby-daddy.  Snark.  Snark.)  Yes, we need to make sure they have the information for their decision, and ample counseling before and after they make their decisions.  But, the most extreme example of why Prop 4 is a bad idea is Teeny Bopper A, who has been raped by her father.  Um, do I need to spell out why “parental notification” would be a bad idea?  I posit that many parents feel threatened by this idea because they worry about losing communication with their children.  Well, step up your game, parents.  It would be unfair to say, “If you were a good parent, your kid wouldn’t be knocked up in the first place,” but there are things you can do throughout your child’s life to facilitate communication.  Don’t wait for it to come down to doctor notification.  It’s not unfair to say, “If you were a good parent, you would foster trust in your child for yourself, and you would trust your child to come to you.”  Unless, you know, you’re Oedipus Rex.
  • Props 5-7: Low-profile propositions.  Because these aren’t so glamorous, I am still not done with my research.  To be continued…
  • Initiative Constitutional Amendment Proposition 8: Limits on Marriage.  NO.  No, no, and no.  I’m not calling this the “Ban on Gay Marriage” because I believe that this doesn’t affect only the queer community; this affects all of us.  No, I’m not planning to marry anyone, man or woman, anytime soon.  But, that’s just the point.  It’s not like I’m going to find some guy, go to the city council, and say, “Hey, I need a marriage license.  Not one of those old-fashioned ones.  I WANT A GAY ONE!”  No one can force me to gay-marry, just as no one can force a church to accept those who gay-marry.  I think this is a term so ludicrous that it bears repeating: gay-marry.  People who are painting this as a freedom of religion issue don’t seem to realize that we get our civil rights through civil unions.  Because I’m not of a Western religion, I will probably be getting a “civil union” anyway.  Again, this has nothing to do with what your own house of worship will need to accept.  You clearly know your religion much better than I do, so you know what your church/temple/mosque wants and doesn’t want.  It has everything to do with government recognition of the contract between two people (for love, money, or state residency); it has everything to do with being comforted by the presence of your spouse when you’re on your deathbed; it has everything to do with basic human dignity.  Counter-worry #1: Churches will lose their tax-exempt status if they don’t perform gay marriages.  NO.  In fact, the “danger” of losing tax-exempt status comes when churches politicize (I almost said prostitute; it’s similar) themselves, as some churches have recently done.  Counter-worry #2: Children will learn in schools that gay marriage is correct.  Hm.  (Here’s what I envision this meaning–I go into a second-grade classroom.  I say, “Children, today, we will learn about gay marriage.”  We all paint rainbows on our faces and I tell them about sodomy, because that’s what gay people do.  Oh, and also, they’re all simpering male hairstylists.  Right.  Snark.  Snark.)  We don’t really “teach marriage” in classrooms anyway, despite references to health class requirements.  Children already know that different marriages work differently–by the time we’re in elementary school, we know plenty of people who, unfortunately, have divorced parents or other “non-traditional” families.  Only you can tell your kids what’s right.  You have the right to teach your children that two men marrying is improper, or that two women marrying is wrong.  If that’s what your church teaches you, then that is what you teach your children.  That’s not what the government aims to change.  This is not a freedom of religion issue because the government is not changing the religion or how you raise children.  This is a human rights issue.  I’m voting NO on Prop 8.
  • Props 9-12: More research needed.  To be continued…

These are my policy views.  I would love to discuss them with you.

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Marking Time

October 13, 2008 at 7:40 pm (College, Life, Posted by Cindy, sports)
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There’s an oft-forwarded email that beseeches us to take charge of our time–“Ask the cancer patient what a year means; ask the commuter what a minute means,” and with various time increments in between.  There is also the song from Rent, which, incidentally, is how I know the number of minutes in a year.  Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes.  How do you measure a year in a life?  I remember a fifth-grade classmate singing “Seasons of Love,” but I never placed it in context until the film came out in 2005.

Time is forefront in my mind these days.  I celebrated my 21st birthday last week–all week.  It is now, in my senior year of college, that I wonder how I’ll mark my time when I’m no longer in school.  I want to go to grad school for genetics/genomics, but what kind of program and for how long is still up in the air.  Regardless, I will no longer have a pat answer for, “What year are you?”  Tomorrow, I’ll be taking the GRE.  Time pressures are often a concern for standardized tests.  In addition, I’ve heard the GRE described as the bastard step-child of the standardized tests; will I come out of the GRE/grad school application process feeling as though it was a four-hour waste of my time?

Yesterday, I watched the Chicago Bears play the Atlanta Falcons.  The Falcons were leading in the fourth quarter when the Bears scored a touchdown!  Hurray!  (I usually like Chicago when Cleveland isn’t involved.)  It looked like the clock would work in Chicago’s favor, as there wasn’t much time left in the game; unfortunately, Atlanta then had enough time to score a field goal.  Now, the clock worked against Chicago, because it had wasted too many seconds in trying to keep Atlanta from having the chance to score.  Sportscasters love to talk about teams that can control the clock; it is particularly salient just how manipulative they can be when we consider how long a professional football game actually lasts, given that each quarter is fifteen minutes long.  From charged time-outs to running out-of-bounds, we mark time very differently in a football game from, say, the GRE.

Your time is precious; as is mine.  I need to do some last minute studying, but more importantly, I’m watching the Browns play the Giants right now.  GO CLEVELAND!

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