"All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy

Day 35

My swollen calf the morning after DIP rehearsal (from a bee sting, not actual dancing fyi).

So, typical DIP practice from 9AM-10PM.

Most eventful thing that happened today? Rolling over a bee and getting stung during Formosa practice at 9PM. -_- How a bee managed to get indoors on the hardwood floor of the STC banquet hall at night is beyond me, but I now have a swollen calf for memories. 

Also, a thank you to Will Jaw who brought me chocolate to cheer me up when I turned into a crybaby after being stung. I haven’t eaten it yet, but I WILL (lol get it?) Thank you so much! It really means a lot to me and I hope I didn’t freak you out too much with my tears… haha (: 

Day 34

I didn’t actually make the Creole Chicken on this day, I made it earlier this week and I just forgot to upload it. :P Twas delicious though! I must say that I LOVE marinating raisins and then baking them though. They turn out so juicy and yummyy! Also, coating chicken in brown sugar before pan frying is possible THE most genius idea ever. I totally recommend it if you’re a fan of sweet chicken!

By the way, what I actually did on this day was dance from 10AM-9PM, somewhat less exciting, I know, lol. (:

Day 33

Today I drove to Riverside to pick up Kimberly, picked up my grandma from her apartment, went to Winco’s, and then went home where we made carrot cake for the first time. Carrots, by the way, are exceedingly difficult to grate and cream cheese frosting (despite its deliciousness) has waaaaay too much sugar to not feel guilty about. :P Also, rageragerageangerangeranger at the USC Financial Aid Office. ):<

After a day’s work, I went on una cita romantica con mi novio! (: We had dinner at Buca Di Beppo where the wall decor entertained us immensely and where quite possibly every employee in the restaurant checked on us every 2 minutes. After the lovely dinner, we watched Water for Elephants (@ $3.75/ticket, no less! :D), which I found to be a pretty good movie. Despite USC and _____’s bs that stressed me out at the beginning, it was truly a lovely evening spent with even lovelier company and I’m so grateful for all that. <3 (: 

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Day 32

My grandma came home from Taiwan and brought home lots of Taiwanese snacks like this delicious idk-what-it’s-called-in-English!

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Day 31

Hmm don’t remember what I did today, so here’s a picture of Charlie in a Winnie the Pooh costume. 

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Day 30

Today my brother shaved his head and I failed miserably at steaming asparagus. I did, however, successfully make hotdogs! I also took Charlie on a walk with my dad and tried to go to Meow Meow for their heavenly brown sugar iced milk tea, but didn’t realize that they’re closed on Tuesdays. ): Booooo just a reaffirmation that Tuesdays are always the worst days of the week… “/

Dear Risque Kim,

I know you’ve already heard 13490348930 of these sad goodbye letters, but I’m going to write you one anyways. 
I really can’t express how much I valued your friendship these last 2 years, and still do. Although 2 years doesn’t seem like much, I have to say you were one of my closest friends (and still are (:). Your ability to make every moment silly, happy and cheerful is honestly irreplaceable and I can’t tell you how much I’m going to miss you…  I know I’m not the only one who thinks this because you have affected so many other people in the same way you have affected me, but I sincerely hope you come back and visit Cali often. I wish you the absolute best with your new life on the East Coast and as you (hopefully) already know, I’ll always be here for you, whether it be for college dorming advice, grade A bad Spanish, or to grind your cinnamon! Good luck, Risque, although I know you will be amazing in anything and everything that you choose to do. Miss you already! (:

Love alwayz,
Fransissy 

P.S. I picked out some of the most ridiculous photos of us just because I seem to remember those times much more than others. Hopefully you think the same! (:  

P.P.S. Hello, Paranormal Activity 2?!

Day 29

Ilium festivities! 

So I woke up at like 10AM (which a swollen eye btw because a mosquito bit my eyelid… I literally looked like —> -_- the entire day because of it ugh) and super procrastinated on cooking/baking… we were supposed to meet at 1PM, but I didn’t start prepping my banana chocolate chip muffins until 11AM and didn’t get them in the oven until like 11:40. -_- Then, I started my turkey chili around 12PM… ): Bad! Chili is supposed to simmer for at least 30 min so it didn’t turn out as flavorful as it could’ve been had I had time to let it simmer, but thankfully it still turned out pretty good. None of my veggies were undercooked so I was happy with that and it turned out chunky, which is how I like my chili, heh. (: As for my muffins, I decided to try subbing applesauce for vegetable oil after reading some of the tips at allrecipes, but it ended up giving my muffins a weird texture. ): They turned out to be really sticky and clingy to the muffin paper, but I guess it wasn’t too bad since the Ilium kids still said they were good and I ended up with no extras to take home. 

Anyways! So we (me+Tuan) met up with Esther and Tiffiny at Troy and then headed to Craig Park where Hanul and Risque later met up with us. We attempted Tuan’s Trivial Pursuit and then me, Hanul and Risque walked to the gas station to buy some Arizonas/Peace Teas since no one brought drinks lol. Ricky also made me and Hanul climb up a super steep hill with the passing traffic on State College to witness our pathetic climbing all because he didn’t want to go the long way…. D: Charlie, of course, had no problem getting up the hill. -_- After we got back, me + Hanul + Risque teamed up as Team Blue to kick Tuan+Tiffiny+Esther’s butts at Trivial Pursuit. (Okay, we didn’t win, but it was only cause Ricky left in the middle of the game and because of Tiffiny’s darn Hawaii shirt!!!!) After Trivial Pursuit, we moved to the grass where I spread out my super awesome Digimon bed sheet (which also inspired Hanul’s Digimon soundtrack listening lol) and we played Apples-to-Apples twice! Esther won both times…. After that we kinda just lounged/napped and then Sung Hyun came! :D After more lounging and conversing, we headed back to Troy and then made plans to meet up again later for NRB. (: 

Tuan and I went back to P-town where I dropped off Charlie and we took a little break before we went back to Fullerton where we met up with Hanul + Sung Hyun. We met Ricky at Chik-fil-a where Sung Hyun and I split waffle fries and us Asians took like 9348329042 packets of sauce… lol. Theeeen we started NRB-ing around 9PM. Edward came a little later and Jeff & Grace stopped by to say hi! (: After hours of belting out lyrics with some of my favorite people<3, I took Edward & Risque back to Edward’s car, but we took a pitstop at Half&Half on the way. (I love car rides with these boys, btw; talk about endless entertainment while driving down dark scary mountain roads.) I didn’t really like my drink (Almond Coffee milk tea) because it honestly just tasted like coffee which (of course) caused me major bladder distress later on. -_- But anyways, when we finally got to Edward’s car, I was so sad to say goodbye because it was the last time I would see Ricky for a reallyreallyreally long time since he’s leaving for Georgia for the summer and then the East Coast for college. ): ): I will be SURE to take care of your Apples-to-Apples for you! <3