I'm supposed to be taking notes on the Orgo reading right now (I even have the book open to the right page in front of me, honest) but I still can't get over the trauma I just experienced. Allow me to provide a little background:
I used to work in the Yantis Lab so I'm pretty familiar with behavioral experiments. I have a friend who works in this particular lab so sometimes I agree to be a subject over ere too. Two weeks ago, I sign up for a "Learning & Memory Research Study". Sounds innocuous enough. $10 for thirty minutes? Sweet, I'm in.
Fast forward to today, when I go in to actually do the task. I'm told it's an "emotional study" and instructed to rate a series of images on an emotional scale of 1-9. A "1" would denote a very negative emotion, while a "9" would indicate a very positive emotion. Ok, cool, I got this, easiest $10 ever made.
The pictures start off simple enough -- food, scenery, animals. I give these 5-7s, I love my food, and I love my animals...sometimes at the same time. Then, they start presenting pictures of mummies, guns, and crime scenes. I'm like "YAY, CSI" so I give these 6-7s. Suddenly, out pops a picture of a GINORMOUS black widow. It's not exactly a secret that I am scared of spiders. People are just unaware how bad the phobia is. To my credit, I hardly flinch, and I press "1". I start giving myself a pep talk: "OK, got the spider over and done with. No more spiders. You can do this." Then, I notice some of the pictures are repeating. At this point, I get the sinking feeling in my stomach and I'm growing more and more resigned to -- "OH FUCK". Second giant picture of a black widow. I furiously mash on the "1" key. I know there are going to be more, but I reassure myself that I can handle a few pictures of black widows. I keep on going. About thirty pictures later, I'm still going strong, mentally steeling myself for the next picture of a black widow. I'm feeling confident and proud of myself for persevering.
BOOM. GIANT PICTURE OF A TARANTULA.
I scream.
In my haste to get it off the screen, I may have pressed the "5" key. I do a few more pictures, but I can hardly look at the screen because I just KNOW there's going to be more. My hands are kind of shaking when I push open the door.
"Excuse me?"
Nice lady from the lab comes out.
"I'm kind of deathly afraid of spiders. Do you know how many more picture there are of them?"
"Oh, I'm sorry. There should be about three pictures. Yeah, we probably should have asked about phobias beforehand."
"I might have seen them all then. So two black widows and a tarantula?"
"Umm...well, three of each."
FUCK THIS SHIT.
"I'm really sorry, but I don't think I can do this."
While I apologize profusely, she reaches behind me to close the task, which is still running pictures every 2.5 seconds. She gives me a voucher for $10, which I try to refuse because I didn't finish the task. She insists. Apparently, finishing the task is not a requisite for being paid. Personally, I think she just felt sorry for me because I was visibly shaken. By the time I peaced out, I'm a twitchy, paranoid mess.
This is just the latest episode in a long saga of spider-related traumatic events. I've been afraid of spiders for as long as I can remember. When I see them around the house, I am paralyzed with fear and scream for help until my parents come rescue me. I've been known to run out of the shower dripping and naked. You have no idea how much scarier spiders are when they are only blurry black blobs moving on the wall. And I'm not just afraid of the real deal, I can't even look at pictures of them.
When I was in grade school, I told some asshole boys I was scared of spiders. They thought it would be hilarious to stick the Giant Illustrated Book of Spiders in my cubby. When it came time to go home, I needed to grab my homework from my cubby but couldn't get close enough to take the papers out. I cried. Boys got 45 minute detention. Ha.
In fourth grade, we had to read a story in the textbook called "Fear Factor". There was a giant picture of a tarantula on the cover page. Dale, the nicest boy with the largest hands, covered the picture for me until we turned the page. I've always liked Dale.
Middle school, boys (what's with boys and being douchenozzles) flashed pictures of a spider at me from across the classroom until I cried.
When my cousin came over to visit, my Dad took us to go see a vintage car exhibit. The adjacent exhibit was a Spider Exhibit. My Dad has always believed that I needed to try to get over my fear so he insisted that we go in. I'm tense as hell and keep my eyes fixated on the floor. All of a sudden, I hear my Dad say, "Catch!" and see a glimpse of something flying at me. Without thinking, I scream, bat it out of the way, run outside, and cry my little eyes out until my Mom came to collect me. I think my Dad got the dog house for that one. I recently brought this up when, on a road trip, my Dad tricked me into looking at a giant Black Widow replica someone had stuck to their car door. He says, "I don't remember that." ASSHOLE. My mom was like "Nope, that definitely happened." My sister says, "Oh yeah, that was hilarious."
Also, there was the time I was teaching in Taidong, Taiwan when I suddenly saw a tarantula nonchalantly creeping across the classroom in the back. "FUUUUHH. WHAT IS THAT." One boy casually reaches out and smacks the tarantula with his slipper. I'm close enough to see its legs go flying. I thought the situation had been defused, then one boy decides it would be funny to scoop up the remains into a dustpan and chase girls around with it. As the authority figure in the room, I should have stopped it, but technically, I had already hied the hell out of there. My TA, who was a native Taiwanese man, was like "Stop running, it'll encourage them". To which I replied, " I CAN'T. TARANTULA." To my credit, I did not cry.
There was a period in my life where I was not as scared of spiders. I was gradually desensitized by overexposure in Thailand and Taiwan. But I think having gone two years without seeing one in person in Baltimore has brought me right back where I started. Why can't I go to Australia? LOOK UP THE AUSTRALIAN SPIDER. Just thinking about it almost caused a mental breakdown.
Anyways, for those of you who think it would be funny to try to scare me with a spider...don't. I'm serious. I will scream, cry, curse you out, beat you to the ground, unfriend you on Facebook, and never speak to you again. In that order.
God, I'm still seeing spiders everywhere. (shudder) OK. Back to Orgo.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Sunday, January 15, 2012
There and Back Again in 20 Hours
Headed down to So-Cal yesterday morning It was a trip that was conceived of months ago, cancelled recently, and miraculously brought back to life again in the final hour. I was supposed to drive down with Vicky to see Priscilla's Young Guild Artist Recital, but we cancelled at the last moment because of a failure to plan until the last second. I had just come to terms with not heading down when my Dad suggests that we go down as a family. I'm like "That's crazy. Where are we going to stay?" But my Dad was undeterred. "If you want to go that badly, Daddy will find a way." OK, I'm fictionalizing a bit here. The real conversation went a little more like this:
Me: "SCREW THIS. I'm just not going to go. Rawr."
Dad: "We could drive down together. It would be great family time."
Me: (glare) "You're an idiot. Where would we stay."
Dad: "We could get a hotel."
Me: "WE PO. NO."
Dad: "...I'll make a few phone calls."
So Dad makes a few phone calls to some church friends who moved to Irvine a few years ago. Unfortunately, both families had just come up to NorCal for a wedding. So the plan to go down south was cancelled yet again. But, since they were both up in the saner part of California, of course we would have to meet -- so dictated by the Asian Code under paragraph 10, section 3, under the heading "20 Years of Friendship". We invite them over for lunch, my mom cooks up a storm (of which I had little to no part because they started cooking at 10 AM. Such an ungodly hour).A good meal merits good conversation and lunch soon became dinner. Grandma Zhu insisted that we let her treat. Now, I like these families (which is not usually the case with my Dad's church friends), and these families like me (which I find absolutely terrifying) so I didn't mind spending the whole day with them. At Ma Jia Guan (a restaurant with amazing knife-cut noodles and giant sesame cakes...OK, too many parentheticals? I'll stop.), conversation veers again towards So-Cal. All of a sudden, LK Aiyi turns to her husband and says: "Give them the key." Her husband doesn't even blink and gives us the key to his house. HIS HOUSE. And after that, it was pretty much settled. We were going to So-Cal.
The trip down was great. My Dad had stayed up until 3AM keeping track of the Taiwan presidential elections. Dr. Ma was re-elected, thank GOD. We started off the trip on a good note. Anyways, I drive the first one-third of the way, which was disturbingly enjoyable. I mean, driving an average of 80 mph and weaving around trucks and slower vehicles? BOMB. I think I hit 95 mph at one point. Yeah, I know. Some of y'all assholes out there are going "Pfffft. 95? Small potatoes." Well shaddup, this is MY moment.
We get into Irvine at around 4:30PM. By this point, my Dad needs to poo something fierce and I also have a somewhat urgent need for the bathroom. We pull up to LK Aiyi's house and I hear my Dad exclaim "HALLELUJAHHH!" as we all race to her front door. Things were gloriously slow-motion-esque as my Dad puts in the key...turns the...can't turn the...Oh hell no. She gave us the WRONG key. My Dad calls her to explain the situation, she is mortified and tells us to go around, check all the windows, try climbing through the back...all of which we do to no avail. My Dad, who is quickly reaching the breaking...bursting...point, piles us all into the car and makes his way towards the closest shopping center. He drove like a maniac under the control of terrorist bowel movements.His savior came in the form of Kohl's. While he's finding sweet release over a porcelain nirvana, my Mom immediately starts shopping. -__-
I call up the Changs, who are the family we actually came down to see and ask them to Google hotels in the area for us. Nehemiah promptly invites us to stay at their house. Now this is the BUSIEST family in the world. They have church duties, people milling in and out of their house like they own the place, and on top of all that, after her performance, Priscilla is leaving for Baltimore the next morning. We protest but really, at the moment, we see now other choice (besides a shit-expensive hotel). Now, as also dictated by the Asian Code, we go to Ranch 99 to buy a box of pears....and an orchid. My Dad's a fruit.
We get to their house and it is apparent from the moment we enter that chaos is afoot. We decide that we most DEFINITELY cannot stay and cause more trouble. Coincidentally, we run into Cynthia Aiyi, who is another friend from church. She invites us to stay at her place, which is (also coincidentally), a house she is renting from ANOTHER church friend. Once all that was settled, we set off for dinner.
Dinner was Bruxie's, some place I found on yelp that serves waffle sandwiches. Amy would be so proud. When we got there, we ran into some people from the Chang church. Turns out, the recital hall is right across the street. The food was delicious, I'll get the pictures from my Dad later. But mm, chicken and waffles, pulled BBQ pork, Irish nachos...good respite from the craziness of two hours ago.
Priscilla's performance was amazing. I stayed awake through the entire performance...which is a huge compliment. It was a group recital with another boy...something de Fazio, which I remember because it's a freaking cool last name...who played the cello. Anyways, amongst all that class, the Wangs were finding it hard to fit in. My mom made me giggle when during the cello performance, the piano accompaniment hit a very obvious sour note. She made such a face of mortification. Then it was giggle loop time. My Dad start pantomiming his interpretation of each song...which always involved a cat, a mouse, and divine intervention. Oh man, class was abundant.
After the performance, I had a splitting headache. Ok, less splitting, more slow, spinning nausea merry-go-round of DOOM. After stopping off at the Changs to drop off the pictures from the performance, we head over to Cynthia's place. When we're almost there, she says, "Man, I hope they have extra blankets." At this point, I'm curled up into a fetal position of misery. My Dad's like, "If there are not blankets, let's just drive home." We get there, there are blankets, but NO WHERE TO PARK. Guh. Apparently, the apartments are close to UC Irvine and they prohibit parking to prevent a massive take-over by college students. Next thing I know, we're heading back up I-5.
Yeah, I'm majorly devastated that we didn't get to ride the hot air balloon, didn't get to experience the much-extolled virtues of Newport Beach, didn't get to gorge ourselves at Gen, but I'm still thankful for the great time I had with our parents. We were trapped into a little careening vehicle of death for twelve or so hours with no internet to cockblock us from real conversation. Yes, three of those hours were dedicated to politics, but still...family bonding time. Bottom line: I had a blast catching up with the family after a semester apart, I got to support a good friend...and see a show that will probably cost me a LOT more in the future teehee, and I stumbled upon great news. >:]
No regrets. Plus, my parents promised to take me to Point Lobos because they know I LOVE the beach. Mmm...ocean, shores, sand. Nothing like that harbor shit. Baltimore is ass.
Me: "SCREW THIS. I'm just not going to go. Rawr."
Dad: "We could drive down together. It would be great family time."
Me: (glare) "You're an idiot. Where would we stay."
Dad: "We could get a hotel."
Me: "WE PO. NO."
Dad: "...I'll make a few phone calls."
So Dad makes a few phone calls to some church friends who moved to Irvine a few years ago. Unfortunately, both families had just come up to NorCal for a wedding. So the plan to go down south was cancelled yet again. But, since they were both up in the saner part of California, of course we would have to meet -- so dictated by the Asian Code under paragraph 10, section 3, under the heading "20 Years of Friendship". We invite them over for lunch, my mom cooks up a storm (of which I had little to no part because they started cooking at 10 AM. Such an ungodly hour).A good meal merits good conversation and lunch soon became dinner. Grandma Zhu insisted that we let her treat. Now, I like these families (which is not usually the case with my Dad's church friends), and these families like me (which I find absolutely terrifying) so I didn't mind spending the whole day with them. At Ma Jia Guan (a restaurant with amazing knife-cut noodles and giant sesame cakes...OK, too many parentheticals? I'll stop.), conversation veers again towards So-Cal. All of a sudden, LK Aiyi turns to her husband and says: "Give them the key." Her husband doesn't even blink and gives us the key to his house. HIS HOUSE. And after that, it was pretty much settled. We were going to So-Cal.
The trip down was great. My Dad had stayed up until 3AM keeping track of the Taiwan presidential elections. Dr. Ma was re-elected, thank GOD. We started off the trip on a good note. Anyways, I drive the first one-third of the way, which was disturbingly enjoyable. I mean, driving an average of 80 mph and weaving around trucks and slower vehicles? BOMB. I think I hit 95 mph at one point. Yeah, I know. Some of y'all assholes out there are going "Pfffft. 95? Small potatoes." Well shaddup, this is MY moment.
We get into Irvine at around 4:30PM. By this point, my Dad needs to poo something fierce and I also have a somewhat urgent need for the bathroom. We pull up to LK Aiyi's house and I hear my Dad exclaim "HALLELUJAHHH!" as we all race to her front door. Things were gloriously slow-motion-esque as my Dad puts in the key...turns the...can't turn the...Oh hell no. She gave us the WRONG key. My Dad calls her to explain the situation, she is mortified and tells us to go around, check all the windows, try climbing through the back...all of which we do to no avail. My Dad, who is quickly reaching the breaking...bursting...point, piles us all into the car and makes his way towards the closest shopping center. He drove like a maniac under the control of terrorist bowel movements.His savior came in the form of Kohl's. While he's finding sweet release over a porcelain nirvana, my Mom immediately starts shopping. -__-
I call up the Changs, who are the family we actually came down to see and ask them to Google hotels in the area for us. Nehemiah promptly invites us to stay at their house. Now this is the BUSIEST family in the world. They have church duties, people milling in and out of their house like they own the place, and on top of all that, after her performance, Priscilla is leaving for Baltimore the next morning. We protest but really, at the moment, we see now other choice (besides a shit-expensive hotel). Now, as also dictated by the Asian Code, we go to Ranch 99 to buy a box of pears....and an orchid. My Dad's a fruit.
We get to their house and it is apparent from the moment we enter that chaos is afoot. We decide that we most DEFINITELY cannot stay and cause more trouble. Coincidentally, we run into Cynthia Aiyi, who is another friend from church. She invites us to stay at her place, which is (also coincidentally), a house she is renting from ANOTHER church friend. Once all that was settled, we set off for dinner.
Dinner was Bruxie's, some place I found on yelp that serves waffle sandwiches. Amy would be so proud. When we got there, we ran into some people from the Chang church. Turns out, the recital hall is right across the street. The food was delicious, I'll get the pictures from my Dad later. But mm, chicken and waffles, pulled BBQ pork, Irish nachos...good respite from the craziness of two hours ago.
Priscilla's performance was amazing. I stayed awake through the entire performance...which is a huge compliment. It was a group recital with another boy...something de Fazio, which I remember because it's a freaking cool last name...who played the cello. Anyways, amongst all that class, the Wangs were finding it hard to fit in. My mom made me giggle when during the cello performance, the piano accompaniment hit a very obvious sour note. She made such a face of mortification. Then it was giggle loop time. My Dad start pantomiming his interpretation of each song...which always involved a cat, a mouse, and divine intervention. Oh man, class was abundant.
After the performance, I had a splitting headache. Ok, less splitting, more slow, spinning nausea merry-go-round of DOOM. After stopping off at the Changs to drop off the pictures from the performance, we head over to Cynthia's place. When we're almost there, she says, "Man, I hope they have extra blankets." At this point, I'm curled up into a fetal position of misery. My Dad's like, "If there are not blankets, let's just drive home." We get there, there are blankets, but NO WHERE TO PARK. Guh. Apparently, the apartments are close to UC Irvine and they prohibit parking to prevent a massive take-over by college students. Next thing I know, we're heading back up I-5.
Yeah, I'm majorly devastated that we didn't get to ride the hot air balloon, didn't get to experience the much-extolled virtues of Newport Beach, didn't get to gorge ourselves at Gen, but I'm still thankful for the great time I had with our parents. We were trapped into a little careening vehicle of death for twelve or so hours with no internet to cockblock us from real conversation. Yes, three of those hours were dedicated to politics, but still...family bonding time. Bottom line: I had a blast catching up with the family after a semester apart, I got to support a good friend...and see a show that will probably cost me a LOT more in the future teehee, and I stumbled upon great news. >:]
No regrets. Plus, my parents promised to take me to Point Lobos because they know I LOVE the beach. Mmm...ocean, shores, sand. Nothing like that harbor shit. Baltimore is ass.
Saturday, January 7, 2012
Republican Debate
I'm not the most politically conscious person, but hanging out with Kimberly for the past three consecutive days made me pause when I came across the debate while channel-surfing. Call it morbid curiosity, if you will. I mean, if I'm going to disagree with Republicans, I should at least know what it is exactly I'm disagreeing with...
First of all, I love the standing arrangement. Romney in the middle, flanked by Santorum and Ron Paul. Gringrich is a bit further off center. Then waaaaay off to the side, you got Rick pArry and Jon Huntsman. SAD! But hilarious.
Anyways, if I were to play the average citizen and evaluate the candidates by appearances alone, I must concede that Romney does look the most "presidential" out of the bunch. Santorum lacks a chin, Ron Paul looks like a cross between Gandalf and Master Oogway, and Gingrich looks like a squib. I think Rick Perry would come in second-place for the most presidential-looking candidate cuz DAMN he wears nice suits, except he's got that dumbass look so reminiscent of George W. Bush. Poor Jon Huntsman just looked so eager to please--"Ooh! Ooh! Pick me! Pan the camera over here!"
Look at all 'em candidates with their patriotic pins. BUT WHAT'S THIS? WHERE'S RON PAUL'S?? He clearly hates America.
So I'm watching the debate and I didn't even realize that I was commenting out loud until my mom goes, "If it makes you so angry, why are you still watching?" BECAUSE I MUST MOTHER. If America falls into the hands of one these...lovely people, God forbid, I would like to be able to predict how our nation as we know it will go to shit...well, faster than it is now, anyways.
The one thing that irked me was how little respect the candidates showed our current president. Anything is always "better than what we have now". Why can't we politely disagree? Why does everything have to be " I disagree with you so I'm going to completely ignore anything you've accomplished." So frustrating.
Speaking of respect, Huntsman breaks out in Chinese! Mad props. Apparently, he's the former ambassador to China and he called out Mitt Romney in Chinese saying he knows nothing about the economic situation with China. I laughed out loud.
I'm not going to go into my own opinions, but let's just say I had a GRAND time listening to the debate over gay marriage, hypothetical bans on contraception, and military spending.
Come Monday, my registration for an absentee ballot is going out in the mail. MONDAY...because today is SATURDAY and mail is not MAILED until MONDAY. D:
God, with Taiwan and American politics going down simultaneously, I have such low esteem for mankind.
First of all, I love the standing arrangement. Romney in the middle, flanked by Santorum and Ron Paul. Gringrich is a bit further off center. Then waaaaay off to the side, you got Rick pArry and Jon Huntsman. SAD! But hilarious.
Anyways, if I were to play the average citizen and evaluate the candidates by appearances alone, I must concede that Romney does look the most "presidential" out of the bunch. Santorum lacks a chin, Ron Paul looks like a cross between Gandalf and Master Oogway, and Gingrich looks like a squib. I think Rick Perry would come in second-place for the most presidential-looking candidate cuz DAMN he wears nice suits, except he's got that dumbass look so reminiscent of George W. Bush. Poor Jon Huntsman just looked so eager to please--"Ooh! Ooh! Pick me! Pan the camera over here!"
Look at all 'em candidates with their patriotic pins. BUT WHAT'S THIS? WHERE'S RON PAUL'S?? He clearly hates America.
So I'm watching the debate and I didn't even realize that I was commenting out loud until my mom goes, "If it makes you so angry, why are you still watching?" BECAUSE I MUST MOTHER. If America falls into the hands of one these...lovely people, God forbid, I would like to be able to predict how our nation as we know it will go to shit...well, faster than it is now, anyways.
The one thing that irked me was how little respect the candidates showed our current president. Anything is always "better than what we have now". Why can't we politely disagree? Why does everything have to be " I disagree with you so I'm going to completely ignore anything you've accomplished." So frustrating.
Speaking of respect, Huntsman breaks out in Chinese! Mad props. Apparently, he's the former ambassador to China and he called out Mitt Romney in Chinese saying he knows nothing about the economic situation with China. I laughed out loud.
I'm not going to go into my own opinions, but let's just say I had a GRAND time listening to the debate over gay marriage, hypothetical bans on contraception, and military spending.
Come Monday, my registration for an absentee ballot is going out in the mail. MONDAY...because today is SATURDAY and mail is not MAILED until MONDAY. D:
God, with Taiwan and American politics going down simultaneously, I have such low esteem for mankind.
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