ROR

2010-02-27T17:16:00.002-05:00

Brilliant Subaru, just brilliant.

Snow Delay!

2010-02-24T09:40:00.000-05:00

Two or three weeks ago UMass cancelled Wednesday classes due to a supposed huge winter storm. That storm never came and it snowed for about half an hour that entire day. Administration was pretty pissed about that. So today wake up at 5:30 AM to check the school website to find school was going to be delayed opening at 10:00 AM. So I would have Bio lecture and Microbio lab with the quiz.

So go back to sleep and wake up again around 8 in the morning and find out school opening is delayed until 5:30 PM. They should have just cancelled school, people who have class after 5:30 PM have got to be pissed. Also Tammy notified me of this Japanese sushi buffet in Northampton called Sakura Asian Buffet. Seeing as how we don't have class today, we going to give that place a try.

Olympics Pairs Figure Skating

2010-02-15T23:56:00.005-05:00

2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics Pairs Figure Skating

1. Shen Xue / Zhao Hongbo (CHINA) - 216.57

2. Pang Qing / Tong Jian (CHINA) - 213.31

3. Savchenko / Szolkowy (GERMANY) - 210.60

4. Kavaguti / Smirnov (RUSSIA) - 194.77

5. Zhang Dan / Zhang Hao (CHINA) - 194.34

Although Shen / Zhao's free skate performance was not without flaws, their short program score was so flawless that it was enough for this couple to finally win Olympic Gold. Pang / Tong were in 4th coming into today but their very strong performance tonight vaulted them into Gold before they were bumped by their fellow countrymen down to Silver. Also great job for Zhang / Zhang, although they could not medal, they show how far Chinese pair figure skating has come and great to have 3 out of the top 5 pairs come from the People's Republic of China.

Savchenko / Szolkowy was Shen / Zhao's biggest threat throughout this entire competition and were the favorites before the Chinese couple came out of retirement. Seriously throughout their entire performance I was holding my breathe and they were just 0.7 points behind the Gold coming into today. Kavaguti / Smirnov was tough too but finally the Russian dominance ends, and hopefully here comes an era of Chinese dominance. Kavaguti cannot win a medal even if she switches countries a load of times, she's competed for USA, Japan, and Russia now.

Regardless, go CHINA! 加油！！！

I am so tired...

2010-02-15T18:10:00.003-05:00

So first day of P90X on the "Lean" path involved Core Synergistics. I have to admit, I am tired right now. That was pretty much the hardest workout and the tiredest I have been since the Spring of 2008. Right now my head hurts, my arms feel like rubber, and my legs are sore as hell, but assuming I did this right, I won't feel the bulk of this workout until tomorrow.

Tomorrow after Microbio lab going to move onto the Cardio X workout. This week is going to be a extremely busy week what with all the exams, labs, lab reports, and quizzes but we'll see how everything works out.

Also went to the Sylvan Snack Bar for dinner, and taking the healthy route, or at least healthier than before, and got a Buffalo Chicken Salad with tomato, pickles, jalapeno, etc. Not as bad as I had thought it would taste, and was just as filling as a normal sandwich.

Winter Olympics and P90X

2010-02-15T00:43:00.009-05:00

Happy Chinese Lunar New Years first of all! 新年快乐！！！

So to celebrate the holidays the parents and sister came back to Amherst and we went to the homes of one of our oldest friends. Pretty much the first thing she said when she saw me was "My god, you got fat around the middle!" Now, with my relatives in China when they call somebody fat, it is a complement as well because it suggest that the person's family has money and eats well. Of course in America when you say somebody is fat, well they are fat.

Their son had just come back from China with his wife, and another friend of theirs were as well for the dinner and the son (my elder brother as I had to call him) had gotten really tall, and skinny as well. He also took a jab at my figure by saying something along the lines of how he was skinnier than me now, and also a foot taller. Played it off but like that's all old friends and relatives have been saying lately and finally hit a nerve this time. I've been saying for pretty much the last year or so that I would get active, lose weight, and to this point I've probably gained even more weight. Anyways after that we ate dumplings, roasted chicken, cod, and watched a re-run of the Spring Gala on CCTV-4.

After the family left to go back and I returned to the dorm, turned on the TV to watch some of the Winter Olympics. It is really sad what happened at the Luge track and I totally understand their precautions and lowering the track, although I'm curious where the women's track will be now that they lowered the men's down to the women's level and the women even further down. Regardless they still hit like 90 MPH. As for that Short Track Skating event, the Koreans had it in the bag and they lost it, what a shame would have been nice to see an all-Asia sweet. Although its interesting to note that if the judges hadn't decided to add that random Canadian guy, the finals would have been an all-Asian affair (3 Koreans, 1 Chinese, 2 Asian-Americans).

Anyways after the games this commercial about P90X came up. I had heard of this from a friend over at Smith College who said she wanted to try it but was apprehensive due to the expensive price tag. Went to some fitness websites and saw how highly acclaimed it was, so I figured why not, and I've got it.

The track that I'll be going down is the P90X - Lean, which includes more cardiovascular activities as opposed to just strength and resistance. I'm slated to start the routines today (its 1:06 AM at the moment) and going to try to mix it in with some early morning jogging. Also watching more of what I eat. During the summer and breaks my roommates/suitemates and I would get drunk and probably order 30-40 dollars worth of wings or McDonalds, no more of that. Lets see what this P90X thing can do.

Also, best of luck to China in the Winter Olympics! 中国加油！！！So far after the Short Program in Figure Skating 3 of the top 5 pairs are Chinese (Gold, 4th, 5th). Best of luck to all Chinese and extension Asian athletes in the games!

2009-11-11T23:37:00.003-05:00

I may have my third fever of the school semester, superb.

2009-07-17T11:51:00.003-04:00

China was amazing, been back in the states for about two weeks now, and it's getting kind of hot, still not near the 42 Celcius temperature that was in China, and every other day we have huge thunderstorms.

Getting new phone, probably either LG Dare, Blackberry Storm, or HTC Ozone. Also going to Boston on Saturday to visit friend. Need to do more running... ate too much good food in China.

2009-05-14T21:41:00.003-04:00

So like went with two of my bros to see if this house near town for the summer. One of them will be living there in the future because the lease transferred to him, and me and the other were looking to sublet from him during the summer. It was a very shitty day, raining like crazy and we made the 10 minute walk into town. We got up to the front door and rang the bell, like 5 minutes later some dude who looks like he just woke up or was high as hell came. One of my bros told him he was taking over the lease, we were going to be subletting, so we were hoping we could look around a bit. The guy was like, no you can't, and just turned around and left. We were just left standing going what the hell just happenend?

Anyways, that was the oddity for today. Right now Celtics in game 6... losing composure and about to let the Magic force game 7. Then Rockets against Lakers. Game 4 for the Rockets was lucky, and there is no way from then on that the Lakers were going to let the Rockets beat them. Lakers crushed in game 5 and I expect this game 6 to be no different.

Other than this, what else happenend since last update... we initiated our Alpha class, 8 pretty strong men. Summer is coming up, either going back to China, or just staying here and doing the usual with taking classes and working. Try to get myself back into shape and hopefully get back into Ultimate. Won't be able to play with Zoodisc during the fall still due to heavy afternoon schedule, so will probably pickup with the B team for tournaments, and see what happens during the Spring.

2009-02-12T03:47:00.002-05:00

Seriously, Influenza sucks.

Had first signs of it on Friday while doing tables for DX, noticed throat feeling uncomfortable. By Saturday morning couldn't even get up, dizzy, coughing, sneezing, all that. Fast forward to today (Thursday morning), the headaches and dizziness is gone, but coughing is worse than ever. Doesn't hurt as bad in the throat anymore, rather it is just a lot of coughs that hurt my lungs, the worst. So can't even breathe well, or sleep for that matter, cause its almost 4 AM now thanks to the cough. Might as well do paper instead of sleep eh?

Got first Physics lab coming up, 12:20 - 2:30 PM or something, should be fun... or something. Oh look, it appears I have to get some lab materials for it, more opportunties to spend money on textbooks and whatever. It's not like I lots of money or anything. Still have to play for... DX dues, DX gear, Lil's gear, Medicine co-pay, and no add more books, and lab goggles if I can't find my old ones.

Meanwhile, TiV looked fun, muddy as hell though, feel bad for those wearing lights cause that ain't ever coming out.

Fall Semester 08 Pictures

2008-12-18T17:13:00.007-05:00

D-Chi, Winterball, Retreat, Chi-O Mixer, Security, all that good stuff.

2008-11-24T01:34:00.001-05:00

ΔΧ
UMass Colony
Founding Class Fall 2008
#13 "Sonic"

NYC

2008-08-08T12:54:00.001-04:00

This past weekend took a trip down to New York City with another friend at Umass to visit… more friends from UMass. I was shocked to make it to her house in Eastern Mass to be honest, usually not really good at driving the city and its boroughs. Traffic was a mess that day, and after I got to her house and met up with her, took another hour or so just to get into the city and to Chinatown’s South Station, where we caught the 7:00 PM Lucky Star bus to NYC.

The bus ride was peaceful with the Chinese driver pushing the bus to like 80 mph the entire way there, and we got there around midnight or later. Passed the long bus ride by watching an episode of Coffee Prince, and just sleeping and listening to iPod. Steph, Tracie, and a friend of theirs from Rutgers, Ray, picked us up on Grand St. and we headed back to Steph’s place in New Jersey. Seriously people need to learn how to merge lanes, because it took about an hour and half for a football length’s amount of cars to merge into a single lane. We finally got into her town like around 1:30 AM or so and everybody pretty much knocked out right away cause we were suppose to get up at 7:00 AM to head to Corona Park in Flushing for the 18^th Annual Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival.

I wake up next morning and it was like 9 or 10 already, and after everyone got ready it was like nearly 11, and we didn’t even get to the park until about noonish. We parked on the opposite end, and on a humid day, it was a tough walk over. I was in awe, I had never been to a Dragon Boat race before, and the atmosphere was electric, much better than the ones on an Ultimate field. We managed to catch Steph’s old team, NJ Dragons in one of their semi-final heats. They had a good lead until about 50 feet left, where HSBC’s team just went berserk and torched everybody in the final stretch. Steph caught up with her old teammates and we just wandered around before all going back to the car, by then it had gotten really dark, and just as we stepped into the car, there was lightning and rain started coming down.

We drove to Times Square, intending to park near there and do some shopping, hit up Korean Town and China Town. It was bad because there wasn’t any parking, and the garages were around 50 bucks for just 2 hours. So instead us 4 drove to Manhattan’s Chinatown and just parked there for 40 dollars till midnight. We then went to Great NY Noodles, where I had some of the best thin string spicy beef noodles. Some really tall (like 6-10) Chinese dude came in and sat down next to us, pretty sure he looked like the Zhang guy who was on the Chinese Basketball National Team last year and the one who played with the Knicks Summer League team this past summer.

Anyways after this we met up with another kid from Bronx, Kai. Apparently he goes to UMass and lived in the same building as Jenessa, but I’d never seen him. We 5 went to the Elizabeth Center for some Sticky Pics!!! And I ate again at another noodle place with Kai because he was bitching that he was hungry, the girls went and got bubble tea. We also called up another friend from Smith College whose family owned stores in Chinatown, and she came over and caught up with us before headed one of her stores. We then took the subway over to Times Square and started shopping for clothe for that night’s dinner, we were going to Blue Fin, a fancy restaurant right in the middle of Times Square.

Shopping sucked, stuff was way to expensive, and after hours of many stores I settled on a Nautica navy polo with white and red stripes, which interestingly matched my 3 UMass bracelets. We walked over to Blue Fin and the place was pretty impressive, there were even bathroom attendants who wiped your hands for you. The food was expensive as hell too, as expected from such a high class place. I ordered a Philly Sushi plate and Yellowtail Ceviche, and the Ceviche was something new, wasn’t too bad, and surprisingly filling. The bill nearly blew my mind; I don’t think I’ve ever had such an expensive meal, with the bill coming to nearly $200 for the 5 of us. After pulling together money we went to Westin Hotel and chilled at their bar, the people there were extremely friendly and we just chilled, drank, and Tracie and I just watched Steph and Jenessa argue with Kai on how insensitive he was.

Kai left after Westin to chill with some other people and we took the Subway back to Chinatown and headed back to NJ for some drinking. We would have hit up the clubs, but Steph and I are just a month or two from 21. So we basically just went back to her house and got drunk (Steph was out after like a beer and half, Jenessa was downing shot after shot of Absolut though).

Next morning we woke up around noon again and drove about 5 minutes to Minado, the Sushi buffet. My god I was like a little kid in a candy shop. My eyes lit up when I was looking at the huge assortment of sushi, any kind you can think of! Had two huge plates filled with sushi, then some dynamite seashells, and topped it off with strawberry cake and green tea ice cream. Bill was in the triple digits and I paid for it, but it was worth it. Then Steph drove us a couple town over for the bus to New York, and we chilled in the car and blew bubbles. After hugging and saying good bye to Steph, Tracie, Jenessa, and I hopped on the bus, and it was crowded. We (along with like 20 others) had to stand in the middle the entire way from Jersey into Port Authority, pretty sure that’s illegal. From there we took a train to Chinatown and Tracie walked us to the Lucky Star stop at Grand St. where she took a train back to Brooklyn and we hopped on the bus.

The bus ride back wasn’t as pleasant. We watched another episode of Coffee Prince, but there was so much traffic again (people’s inability to merge into one lane!) that cost us another hour or two, no to mention the obnoxious and immature people making prank calls at the top of their lungs and laughing and jumping up and down. We left at 6 on the dot, and didn’t get into South Station until about midnight. We called Jenessa’s sister, and while waiting ate at some Vietnamese restaurant in Chinatown, some of the best smoked chicken, duck, and pork with price I’ve had in a while. Since it was late, we decided I would sleep over at her house (surprised her dad allowed it), and so we just chilled and talked after getting back to her house before passing out around 4 or 5 AM.

Left her place around 10 AM and intended on driving to Worcester to pick some stuff up. Think I got on I-93 in the wrong direction thought because I ended up in Cambridge somehow. Managed to find my way back on the highway and was looking for landmarks that I knew how to get back from. Ended up headed in the Logan/Winthrop direction, and from there easily found my way back on the Pike and eventually got to Worcester, picked up stuff and ate lunch, and then drove back to Amherst.

All in all I had an amazing trip, and despite spending so much money, I’d do it all over again in an instant because it was so much fun. Steph turns 21 on September 15^th and we’ll all probably head back into the city for some partying. In the meantime need to start prepping for school again, I have training I think in two weeks or so, and then school starts.

Maybe I'll post pictures later, maybe not.

Feet Injuries

2008-07-10T09:17:00.001-04:00

Today’s Thursday, SULA day, but the left foot is still sprained and bending it still causes excruciating pain. This made me think of all the feet-related injuries I’ve had in my life, and oddly I can only think of 3, probably a good thing.

First time I severely sprained my ankle was when I was still going to elementary school in China, I fell down a flight of stairs and rolled all the way to the bottom (this was the stairs leading up to a huge platform 4 stories high).

Second feet-related injury was during junior year of high school. We were practicing for breakdancing club during gym and we were doing backflips and handstands. I propped onto a handstand and attempted to flip backwards onto my feet and kind of missed it. Ended up someone jamming my right foot diagonally into the ground, dislocating my toe. Went to the hospital and after like 2 hours the doctor finally popped it back in place, or so she said. The next couple days it hurt like hell (I was on crutches), so I went back to my own doctor, who was also my friend’s dad and team doctor for the UMass football team, and found out she didn’t fix it, but made it even worse. I got this shot in the foot to numb it, which hurt like hell, and then he just grabbed the toe and snapped it back into place.

And then there is this summers’ sprain. Making the in cut and slipping on the wet grass, hearing a huge crack and that moment I thought I’d broken my ankle or something. Got carried to my car from practice and drove to the hospital (thank god for automatics), and the nurse initially diagnosed me with a broken ankle, later to be determined as a severely sprained ankle with a partial fracture.

So while not being able to run, have been going to Golds Gym on a consistent basis, and noticed that I’ve been able to improve my bench and lifting by about 15 pounds since the beginning of the summer. Need to find some way to do some form of cardio because all this weights are only making me bigger, whereas I am aiming for a leaner but stronger figure.

Also, paid 808 the money for the Downtown Brown jerseys, damn they are just absolutely sick. As for heading out to California for a week or so, that’s looking kind of not happening. Not only is money an issue, but time too. I have work this weekend and next weekend, then I have to visit friends in Boston and New Jersey (for at least a couple days each). By then it will be August and who knows what. Plus tickets are over 200 dollars and I am not guaranteed a place to stay anymore due to my friend over in Irvine being evicted and whatnot. But who knows, it might happen it might not, it’s a 50/50 thing right now.

SULA + Ohio

2008-07-03T13:11:00.002-04:00

So I finally contacted SULA and got all this sorted out, and found my team and got my captain and all that. Too bad can't go to the games today, because I'm sitting about 750 miles away. So I was just going to spend the 4th of July weekend either sleeping or going to the city, but instead my Dad calls me and figures we'd go home, so we drove from about 7 PM to 6AM and now we're back.

So good to be back. 808's Downtown Brown and YR jerseys are absolutely sick and will be great to get them.

Westward bound..?

2008-06-26T08:22:00.004-04:00

So I don't know what the deal is with SULA, pretty sure the league's started, but I haven't gotten any notices from captains or anybody. I can't play because the ankle is still swollen and bending it hurts a lot, but would still be nice to know that at least there is a team to go to once it's all healed.

Planning for a trip out West in late July. Was entertaining the idea of going back to China. Axed. Going to Australia/New Zealand, not enough money. There is a chance I might not even have enough money to head out West, but we'll see. If I go, it will be flying from Boston to LAX or Long Beach. If I go to LAX, maybe spend a day or two there before headed to Irvine, then SF. If I go to Long Beach I think one of my friends from Irvine will pick me up, and I'll use his house as a base of travel. Maybe hit up LA, then SF, and maybe head North to Davis or something, who knows.

Also the gym workouts have been good, been noticing some subtle changes in tone and stuff. Got to keep it up the entire summer, eat healthy, and hopefully I'll be back up and running soon.

HA-HA! Broken!

2008-06-13T20:56:00.001-04:00

First practice with Jiggle the Handle, a competitive mixed club team out in the valley. During inter-team scrimmages, I planted with my left foot, rolled it on the wet grass, and my ankle snapped. Within a minute it was twice the size of my right foot. Splendid way to start off the season and the summer.

Workout

2008-06-08T01:35:00.002-04:00

Man, I honestly say I can't remember the last time I was this tired. Did a campus loop followed by a series of sprints up a hill next to my dorm... after that last set I could barely stand up straight and had to rely on a metal rail that led up the hill to get back up to my dorm. After getting into the dorm I couldn't get up to the 4th floor and had to sit on the stairs for several minutes before dragging myself up to my room. Really out of shape... guess this is the first step in a long series of steps to get back into shape and whatnot. In like 5-6 hours, going to head to Gold's Gym.

2008 Graduation

2008-05-26T03:02:00.004-04:00

Last Saturday was Class of 2008's graduation. Most of friends like Steph, Jenessa, and Tony went home couple days earlier, but all of them made the trip back, even Steph from Jersey. Lin, Amy, Seth, along with Hoson and Justin (ΛΦΕ) were all walking. Saw bunch of other people graduated too. My good friend Cynthia's husband John was honored as the top student at UMass is going to MIT for his Ph'D in astronomy or biochemistry next year, crazy stuff.

Planning to get a haircut on Tuesday cause pretty sure the shops are not opened on Monday. Its starting to get pretty hot and working out with long hair isn't very comfortable. Also been slowly packing my room, it's going to take so long to move. Classes at HCC start 6/2, two online classes (Biology and American Literature II), and a Biology Lab. Also wonder if there is still enough time to sign up for SULA (Summer Ultimate League of Amherst), since there aren't any teams in the valley anymore, figure should try to at least keep the rust off the throws.

Chilling with ZooB

2008-04-28T02:45:00.003-04:00

Kickball

2008-04-28T02:33:00.002-04:00

Ah well today was the Annual Southwest North Kickball Tournament. My first semester our cluster barely lost to eventual champions James-Emerson like 4 runs to 3. Then I missed last year’s tournament due to Western New England Sectionals, but from what I heard we lost big, like 15 – 0 and the mercy rule had to be implemented. This year’s tournament we wanted to do better, and I wasn’t the only one. We had several soccer players, my teammate Max and I, but the rest of our staff aren’t really sports material. We are a mix of undergraduate and graduate staff; therefore we are not a cluster filled with athletic undergraduates. Two of our graduate RA’s are like sub-5 feet tall Asian girls who are no more than 100-120 pounds, and others were grossly overweight. We actually were missing like 2 or 3 RAs who had work/lab.

So this year the tournament was held at the Intramural fields, but not the grassy side, unfortunately the ground was hard and literally no grass. It reminding me of the Vegas fields, it looked like a desert. Our first matchup was Melville-Thoreau, and they got off to a hot start. I was surprised because majority of our staff didn’t even know how to play kickball. I guess being international students might have caused this. MT got like 4 runs in the first inning, but we settled down a little bit more.

During one defensive inning, I was playing shallow 2^nd base, and their kicker popped it over our pitcher to this open gap. I ran backwards and laid out over my shoulder. I caught the ball but somehow when I landed my left elbow jammed into my ribs and it hurt, bad. I don’t remember much, but I think I was rolling on the ground for a while before being lifted off the field. At first I thought I had broken a rib or something, but turns out it was bruised. I returned to play couple outs later, though the half inning I was out MT scored 3 more runs, and we ended up losing 7 – 0. Only after the game ended did I realize, I didn’t kick once!

After the game the adrenaline kind of wore off and everything started hurting. My ribcage area hurt like hell whatever I did, whether it was walking, talking, eating, or simply just breathing. After the loss we thought it was over so we just chilled and ate burgers, hot dogs, and chips from the barbeque. Turns out we weren’t done and were scheduled to play Coolidge. However they forfeited and left and we were instead given a bye and was to play for the 3^rd place game.

Max finally showed up (he had concert band). The team we played (I think it was Kennedy) were a bunch of punks; I guess you could say they had bad spirit. They were taunting our senior staff, and I ended up charging at one of them trying to pick a fight and had to be restrained by Pierre. We played and I had several catches, several tag outs, and one hit and a beautiful slide. Other than that we lost again like 2 – 0 or something. Kind of sad seeing that we didn’t win a single game, nor score a single run. We stayed, ate some more, and just relaxed and watched the final between Melville-Thoreau and defending championships James-Emerson. Melville-Thoreau managed to pull out a close one, and we just packed up and headed back.

Other than that I checked up on some Regionals results. It was mostly the expected results, but I was kind of hoping in the Metro East Penn and Maryland would have gotten to Nationals, but it ended up being Pitt and Delaware again. Next weekend is New England Regionals, so hopefully Zoo will be able to do well and make it to Nationals.

GO PINK!

Sectionals Pics

2008-04-24T22:30:00.005-04:00

Champs of WNE!

2008-04-20T21:15:00.001-04:00

Finally! Since coming to UMass ZooA has lost to Amherst on Sunday both years, but not this year! They faced last year’s national rep from the section Williams and lost 9-11 in the first game, but after that Saturday was pretty much a breeze as they faced nothing but B teams (Middlebury-B, Hampshire, Amherst-B, and Vermont-B). Sunday morning finished up pool play with a trouncing of Westfield-A. They took on the weird guys from Middlebury, who run around with huge mustaches and skirts, seriously those guys are weird. Anyways ZooA managed to pull out a 15-12 victory and finally broke into the championship game. They faced Williams of course, who took out Amherst (though I heard their best handler broke his leg, ouch), and was a tight one, with ZooA finally pulling out a 16-14 victory. This is good because they’ll probably get a decently high seed at Regionals and won’t have to face the likes of Harvard or Brown in the 2^nd round.

For ZooB, I guess you would call this the most successful season in the last couple years. Granted they were playing with 2 former A-teamers (Sliski and McComb), ZooB showed dedication and actually left Sectionals with a winning record, 3-2. They started the weekend 3-0 actually, taking down Westfield State-B, Williams-B and C. ZooB ran into Amherst and Vermont though and just didn’t have any steam left. The freshmen are getting better, but what I get from Captain James is that they have trouble with flicks. Now that the season is over for them, they’ll probably just scrimmage local high schools. Northampton actually contacted me last week about a scrimmage, and I relayed the request to James. I might drop by and toss the disc around with them.

As for this summer, it’s going to be a big one. I am taking a couple summer classes over at Holyoke Community College (1/3 the cost of UMass!), and working at the Business Office again. I’ll be headed into town sometime this week to put in my registration for SULA (Summer Ultimate League of Amherst). I think there are no longer any club teams in the valley, with B.U.R.N being disbanded last summer, so I’ll need something to keep my throws from being rusty. Also need to get back into shape, so guess that’ll mean waking up at 6 in the morning every day to hit the track and then the gym before it gets too hot. My Gold’s Gym membership is just sitting there, wasting away on my bank account, so I probably should use it. Just over a month of school left, and that includes exams week for me, so it’s getting down to the wire. This long weekend I’ve done nothing but sleep (this kind of weather does that to you), might go out drinking with couple of the Zoo guys after I get off work (on duty right now).

Oh yeah, allergies really strong this spring, I didn’t have any last spring. This is really affecting me doing anything, I need stronger medicine.

Practice

2008-04-17T17:04:00.002-04:00

Went to Zoo practice for the first time this semester (wasn’t playing for other reasons), and man it was a thrill to be back. Well I had a good time, but it was hot and I was out of shape from playing ultimate, so it was tough too. Most of the old faces are still there with the addition of one or two new kids, it looked like they had played in high school so not too worried. Obviously my stamina had gone down, and thus so was my agility, but throws were still all good. They were still crisp, on target, and stuff. I feel like the time I spent watching like the Mamabird and Churchill/Rhino videos really influenced me a lot, especially in the way that I fake and step out to throw.

Both Zoo teams have Western New England Sectionals this weekend at Williams. LadyZoo is much better than last year and they finished 2^nd to Williams two weekends ago at Women's WNE Sectionals. For ZooA, they are in Pool B, seeded 2^nd under Middlebury. Honestly I wonder, what would happen if Middlebury makes it to nationals, because those guys are like the superhippies, furthering the stereotype of the pot-smoking, long hair, tie-dye shirt wearing Frisbee player. ZooA took down Middlebury 8-7 at Yale Cup couple weeks ago, but Middlebury made it to the finals of Yale. In the UPA rankings, ZooA is actually ranked 2^nd in the section. Honestly this time in the series is when ZooA usually messes it up. Both my freshman and sophomore year ZooA has lost to Amherst in the semis and has had to fight to win the 3^rd place in the section. Williams always brings it during the series time, and I am pretty sure Vermont has ARHS alumni Kellen and Matt, so they’ll be a threat in the region too.

ZooB is seeded 2^nd to last in Pool A, and at most they’ll probably win a game or two in their pool, and if lucky, play like 2 games on Sunday.

There are a couple new teams at sectionals that are new. I think this is the first time in quite a while that Hampshire College has participated in Sectionals. Also new is Westfield State, who is sending an A and B team. Wasn’t even aware they had a team at all. Anyways this is going to be tight and there is a chance that ZooA might not even make it to Regionals. Even if they do, they’ll probably run into like Harvard or Tufts in the 2^nd round. Hope for the best of them though, cause most of the team has been playing together for a couple years and next year we’ll probably lose a couple key seniors.

Also yesterday one of my former teammates (who is sitting the season out due to injury) asked me to go throw with him and this “hot chick”. Turned out I actually knew this chick, and had actually gone to high school with her. We both had played for ARHS, but she was a year under me. She said she was done with sports and was transferring to some Boston school next year, oh well. It was fun throwing with her though, she was very fundamental and her throws were on the mark, as should be expected players from the Amherst factory.

Also Travis Ford left UMass all of a sudden to coach Oklahoma State basketball, damn traitor.

One last thing, my best friend Ken turns 21 today, going to be an insane night.

Sensualseduction

2008-04-07T14:35:00.003-04:00

So for about a week straight, my friend Steph bugs me non-stopped about this mixer thing in Boston. It costs 20 dollars, and is about an hour and half car drive away, why should I go? Don’t know how but I finally gave in and gave her a yes. This mixer was going to be held at the Foundation Lounge in the Hotel Commonwealth on Commonwealth Ave. It was hosted by the Tufts HKSA, and the colleges in attendance were to be Boston University, Brandeis, Harvard, Northeastern, Tufts, Wellesley, UMass, and BASA/BASIC. Turns out since I was going to drive there I didn’t need to pay for the admission fee into the club, lucky considering how much money we spent. I was trying to get some of my friends to go, but apparently nobody wanted to go clubbing on a school night, in Boston no less; I was cool with it considering I had no class the following day.

So got freshened up and whatnot, then drove over with half a tank of gas (this becomes important) to Johnson to meet with everyone. When I got there, turns out Steph and her group already left, and I was driving down with Lin and her group. I did find one person though, Tony, who was supposed to be in my car. Now this is interesting because despite never meeting the guy before, I had known him indirectly, because he was the boyfriend of my childhood friend for a month or so. We chatted it up and soon Lin came back from picking people up, turns out my good friend Nick, aka Mohican, of Pi Delta Psi was coming along for the trip too, which was great since finally there was someone I knew well. We also picked up Joey, his girlfriend, and John. In Lin’s car was Nick, Lin, Nick’s roommate Kevin (?) and his girl. We left UMass around like 8:20-ish, stopped by a liquor store so Lin could get some stuff to pre-game, and then we finally left.

There was this one point on Route 9 when we were behind Nick (he was driving Lin’s car), and there were 2 cars in front of them. He decides to pass them despite the double lines, and I decided to follow. The instant I get into the other lane, I see oncoming traffic, so we both floor it. He makes it around fine, but I barely manage to squeeze by oncoming traffic… now I see why I don’t do it more often. It was good though because Lin paid for all the tolls on the Pike, which if you add it up in total turned out to be about 10 bucks back and forth. While on the Pike, we decide to check up on the score of the UMass-Ohio State NIT finals, and the lost! 92-85 or something! It was so close, but we always seem to end up losing in the finals of some sort of championship (see Lacrosse, Football, Soccer).

Anyways so we finally make it to Boston with about like 20 minutes left before the club opens for us (we reserved it exclusively). Instead we head over to MIT’s frat row to drop off some tickets so their people could come too. Their frat houses were all big dormitory styled buildings linked together, it looked truly amazing compared to the crap we have at UMass. Being in the MIT campus, Asians left and right, really made me feel kind of inferior. Anyways we left to go eat a bit before the club, can’t remember the name of the Chinese place we went to, but it was some of the best Chinese food I’ve had in America for as long as I can remember. Finally we left and headed over to the club, about an hour and half late… fashionably late.

I wasn’t expecting the place to be in a Hotel first of all, but the bouncers outside looked like they’d beat into a pulp anyone who looked them in the eye. We got in and I was really impressed. The Foundation Lounge was more than I expected, it was fancy, Asian-themed, and pack with lots of hot Asian girls (and loads of Korean guys O_O;;). It was awkward though because we didn’t know anyone, so we mostly hung around our own guys. We finally found Steph and the UMass girls that came ahead of us, and they were happy to finally see some familiar faces as well. I made Nick buy me a Heineken, it was good but I was shocked at the price, $7.50!!! We mostly danced and chilled with our own group, though we found Fu and Calvin, friends from Bentley. I had a Sam Adams afterwards, but damn it was a totally different taste, and honestly I don’t think I see myself drinking it ever again. We then took shots of Sky and it was beautiful, I was so warm and happy afterwards. The rest of the club was a blur really, we danced some more, drank some more, and then for the duration of it we just chilled outside the club and smoked and talked, it was a great feeling and I felt like all my worries float away.

After the club we split up again, I had been drinking and Joey hadn’t, so he offered to drive, so my car and Nick’s car went over to another restaurant in Chinatown to eat (Lin’s boyfriend joined us later), and we all ended up getting tickets from this meter maid for obstruction of road for the street cleaner… such bullshit. I was actually chasing after the car that the meter maid was in, cursing at her and stuff, but Nick, Joey, and Lin grabbed my arms and whatnot and held me back. So $120 of the profit that we made for our University’s TSA goes out the window to pay for parking fines… NICE.

Anyways we finally leave Boston, and Joey insists on driving because he doesn’t want to drive, though both Tony and I were sober. We had about a quarter of a tank of gas when we left Boston and I suggested filling up at a rest stop or something, but Joey said we would be fine, and I went to sleep after that. I get woken up like a hour or so later by Joey, sounding frantic. Rain was pouring so hard that we could barely see, I had no clue where the hell we were, and Joey was telling me that we had been running on empty for about 15 minutes an the car was starting to shake. I was just thinking: please let us make it to a exit or something. Amazingly we were really close to our exit, and 10 minutes later we were at a gas station filling up; we got really lucky this time. So we finally get back around like 4 something and everyone gets dropped off, and I sleepily drive back to my dorm.

So that was Thursday night/Friday morning. I had work at 1 the next day, but I ended up sleeping through my alarm and everything, waking up at 3. Luckily my boss was kind enough to accept my apologies, understanding what I had done previous night, and allowed me to come to the remainder of work without scolding me. I need to buy an alarm clock so I can set multiple alarms and not solely depend on my cell phone. Anyways here are some pictures from the club, hopefully during the summer I’ll visit my friends in Boston and NYC and we’ll go clubbing some more.

Baseball!

2008-03-30T21:53:00.001-04:00

OK, so went to Jonathan’s Sports Outlet looking to buy a new pair of running shoes cause my old pair got fairly beat up. Spent about 20 minutes or so wandering around, unable to decide what I wanted. Half an hour later, Ken and I walk out of Jonathan’s with $40 dollar baseball gloves… nice way to spend money. We’ve been talking about getting gloves and throwing around since the fall, but for some reason we just randomly went in to buy shoes and came out with gloves. We took the gloves over to the Northeast Quad (can finally go there now without fear!) and did some throwing. Honestly I think my arm has gotten stronger since I’ve stopped playing baseball in high school. I can easily throw the length of the quad now, though still lacks stamina, as after about half an hour of the long distance stuff I started to tire. The gloves were pretty nice, but honestly I wonder how often we will be playing baseball. Were the gloves really worth the investment? Its funny cause right after we called it a day Ken wondered if it would be worth it to just return the gloves, since we had our fun, but we’ll see.

On a different note, the Zoo B team had a tournament in Brandies. The tournament was mainly for B-teams in the New England region, so the level of competition was fairly even. There hasn’t been much interest for Ultimate at UMass this past season, with the A team sometimes not even having enough players at practice, or the B team bringing down 8 people to 2 tournaments back-to-back (Beasterns and High Tide). I didn’t go because I was visiting the parents (and I had duty that night, plus the Pi house party), but apparently it wasn’t a total disaster. From the looks of thing they had about 11 or 12 guys over there, 8 of the B-team regulars, former A/B player Dan McComb and Dave Sliski, and A-team’s Steve O’Leski. They ended up finishing 4th out of the 10 teams that were there. They beat Stonehill-B and Brown-C (13-10, 11-8), and lost 1-pointers to Tufts-B and BC-B (9-10, 12-13), and then 10-13 to Conn. College-B. That’s a +1 margin for the overall tournament, though winning more games would have been much more desirable.

I’d like to get some Ultimate in for either of the teams before school is over, but honestly the chances of that look bleak. School and time and work are all against me, but we’ll see. I actually guaranteed the captain of the B-team that I’d go along with them to play at a tournament the first weekend of April, but turns out I have RA Interviews in the morning, then Asian Night at night, followed by the after party at the Pi House, so got to talk to him about that again.

Other than that, back to duty.

What the hell?

2008-03-24T14:19:00.000-04:00

Been a while… School’s keeping me busy, or actually, driving me insane. It’s choosing between sleeping and doing homework, and often times I choose the former, and its totally destroying me. Spring break went by way to fast, like in the blink of an eye I am back at school, sitting in class, listening to 65-year old professors lecture about accounting policies and whatnot.

In a stupid turn of events, I chose to not partake in Zoodisc’s spring season, instead opting for something else which I can’t speak of, but that’s turned out to be a mistake so far. Right now I am deep in thought on whether I should drop this current thing and either gets back to Ultimate, or just drop it all and solely focus on school. The reason I want to drop this thing is that it’s just not fun, sure it takes up the same amount of time as practice, but it’s just not fun. I absolutely despise every second of this new thing, it lingers on my mind 24/7 and it’s driving me nuts. Looking back on it, I can’t see how I ever would have wanted to do this in the first place, why? I’ve talked to my partner in this new thing and we’ve both agreed that this new thing that we are doing is pointless, how will it help us in the long run? They say we will make connections forever, and be part of something big, but how does hating every second of it make it worthwhile? I’ve come to points where I just wanted to absolutely punch everyone around me, making them drop me or something, giving myself an excuse to get out of it. The only reason I’ve lasted this long was because I didn’t want to see myself as a quitter, but honestly, how can you go on doing for weeks something you hate down to the pit of your soul?

The decision will be made tonight probably on whether to go on with this or not. We will me with the head advisor of the process tonight and look over our options, because it’s just not worth it anymore. Plus, I need sleep time and homework time and this is cutting into it.

2008-01-27T22:16:00.001-05:00

Well we got our Zoodisc jerseys pretty early this year. Instead of going with an usual Ultimate jersey provider like VC, Gaia, or Patagonia. This year we got NikePro jerseys, and they are pretty nice. They remind me of NikeWorld jerseys that are worn by like Ohio State and Texas; they are pretty skin-tight at the top and the shorts are extremely baggy. There was one problem though, my home (light) jersey was printed on a small because they mixed up the sizing with a teammate, so he got my size and I got his (the kid's like 5'4 and 100 pounds). It'll be like another 2 or 3 weeks before I get my home again, but its ok, we won't have a chance to step on the field until about early April anyways.

Also the Downtown Brown shorts that Bob sent arrived today, they are pretty nice, my first pair of FiveUltimate shorts. They were a bit short for a large, and didn't have a number (printing mistake), but still pretty sick. They remind me a lot of the GAIA shorts we got during freshman year.

So classes begin tomorrow, LETS DO IT!!!

Ranting Reflection

2008-01-16T13:51:00.000-05:00

Upon reading some inspirational emails from the captains encouraging us to continue working our asses off during our winter break and what that could yield got me thinking of how I came upon this sport in the first place.

I had the pleasure of growing up in Amherst my entire life (in the U.S. anyways), and was surrounding by Ultimate, I just didn’t know it. Up until freshman year of high school, I thought Ultimate was an altered version of golf or something. So in band, I chatted up with some of the percussion players, and found out one of them was on the Ultimate team. I enquired into the sport, and soon realized that it was actually a full-fledging varsity sport, and our school was one of the premier teams in the nation and I had been ignorant all this time about it. Despite ARHS fielding 3 teams for guys and girls (Varsity, JV, and Freshman), I went out for the baseball team, made it, and then quit after just a week due to conflicts with the coaches.

Anyways, I moved up to the highest level of band in the school in sophomore year and found even more Ultimate players, including Gabe Hart (Carleton), Andrew Hollingsworth (USA Juniors, Tufts), and Sam Kanner (Carleton, Subzero), and more. I became more immersed in the sport, and though again I didn’t’ try out for any of the teams (got to love Asian parents and pressure to excel in standardized exams), I slowly learned the basics, such as pivoting and whatnot from just tossing with them during breaks.

Junior year was probably the first year I got really involved with Ultimate. I joined the school’s intramural Ultimate league, and was drafted onto Team Crimson by the captain Gabe, along with Jeremiah (Wisconsin), Shira (Tufts Women), and others. I had no backhand back then, thus my primary duty on the team was to play the lanes and go deep. Looking back it was sort of funny because we had a Korean-Chinese kid on the team, and several other members who were in Chinese class, so we’d shout plays and stuff in Chinese. Anyways we were one of the better teams, finishing I think 10-1 before the playoffs. I remember one game in particular, we were playing the top team in the league, and it was pouring rain, and the score was 12-12, we were trapped deep in own end, I threw my first completed flick of the season, also took off my receiver’s head though. We ended up losing that game 13-12 on universe point because I was beat to the cone on a hook cut, I laid out but was inches short. I think I was so angry with myself that Gabe (dude’s a great coach) had to hold me out for the first half of the following game so I could regain my calm. When playoffs came we were seeded 3rd I think (top 4 teams make it into the playoffs), and were blessed with good fortune to face the 2nd seed, Purple. Purple was a pretty raw team, and they had a couple guys who eventually made it to Amherst Varsity, they were fast but small. We took advantage of that and shut them down with a 1-3-3.

The finals were under the lights on the soccer field against our rivals Eggplant, and it was one of the single most amazing events I’ve been to for Ultimate. Several hundred people were gathered on the tracks around the field, the lights beaming down from above, that feeling was electric. However one of our go-to guys, Elmo, injured himself during pre-game drills when he went up for a disc and came down awkward, and was more or less useless for the championship game. If I recall correctly, he was our tallest player, and with him out, Eggplant’s deep, who was like 6’3 or 6’4, tore us apart. Gabe, Jeremiah, and Noah (Claremont) handled brilliantly, but we couldn’t overcome our defensive lapses. Don’t quite recall the score, but we lost like by 3 or something. Despite finishing second, the intramural season got me addicted to Ultimate.

I played JV and then senior year I took up Cross Country alongside Ultimate. Cross Country was amazing because like half the Ultimate players were also on the XC team and it was a great way to get in shape (keep in shape for others). Played JV again senior year and there wasn’t many great memories (can’t remember much from senior year Ultimate at all actually), all I know is that we got whipped pretty good, and finished the season with a losing record.

And the rest… history. Well, playing for Umass until this past fall, where I kind of faded in and out of Ultimate. Didn’t make A cause fucked up right knee playing basketball during the summer and couldn’t walk properly until about mid-October, and then got discouraged and stopped attending practice overall. Got out of shape, so trying to work self back into shape, hoping for a better Spring season, and maybe a call-up.

2008-01-15T10:34:00.000-05:00

Hit the gym this morning on part of the winter workout from Zoodisc, and it felt damn good. Spent a good 20 minutes digging my car out of the snow, and in the process of getting my car out I buried the car next to me even deeper. I couldn’t describe the feeling while driving to the gym, everything was perfectly white as far as the eye could see, it was magnificent.

So got to the gym and started with some cardio and rode the bike for about 20 minutes or so on various hill workouts, then moved on to upper body/pectorals and ended with some calf workouts. Overall spent about 50 minutes or so, had to get back to park car, eat breakfast, shower (?), then go to work.

During lunch break planning on heading to the University Textbook Annex to buy my textbooks for the spring semester, and its going to take a pretty big chunk of money… The courses that the annex has in supply currently are:

Accounting 312: Systems Analysis & Design, $93.00
Accounting 331: Cost Accounting, $132.00
Sch-Mgmt 310: Inside Business Writing, $20.50
Management Communications, $51.00

So the total for these 3 classes alone is $296.50. This is not counting the textbook for Accounting 322, which uses the same textbook as a class I took last semester (thank god, saves me like $100 or something dollars), and then there's Accounting 371 (Tax), which does not have a book listed yet, so who knows. Lucky I am working a lot this week so I can pay off that stuff.

Planning on going running tonight, and I'll make sure to wear longer leggings this time so I don't come back with frostbite.

OK so, moments after writing what is above, I get a call from some parent. I was on duty last night and the on call phone was forwarded to my cell phone. The office should have been opened at 10, therefore the phone would have been unforwarded. However it seems like nobody is in the office since the call to the office was forwarded to my phone. Anyways, I picked and its the parent of an athlete that lives in my hall. The team had gone on a 2 week training session in Puerto Rico, and when she got back to her room, she found her door partly opened. The parent was furious and was cussing me out, accusing me of allowing her door to be let opened. I explained to her that several days ago maintenance did a routine check on every room to make sure that the fire alarms were working properly, and that its possible that they may have left the door ajar, because when I came back I found my door opened as well, though nothing appeared to be missing. I suggested her daughter going to the police because its possible that someone broke in, though her mom made it sound like we don't care and we don't have the ability to do anything. A curious thing is that, her daughter got back Saturday, so why the hell is she calling on Saturday, dumb.

Whatever, her problem now. Time for lunch and spending lots of money on books.

Snow Day!

2008-01-14T08:42:00.001-05:00

Alright just thought I’d share some experiences so far this winter. So if you are not currently in Amherst right now you might not know the weather situation; it’s currently snowing like hell outside. So instead of going to the gym and running on the treadmills and whatnot (I would have to dig out my car somehow and drive up a huge slope, not very likely), I thought” what the hell, I should run around Amherst”, and grabbed my shoes, threw on some cold gear, and jumped outside.

On my first step out of my building, I took the step and sank straight down, past my knees, and for the duration of the run around Amherst I was running in snow about halfway up my leg, and I hadn’t bother to wear long leggings. Eventually my legs began to freeze up and I had to seek warmth in some building for a couple minutes before coming out to finish the run. I don’t know much what else to say expect that it was one of the more enjoyable runs I’ve had in quite a while, despite that my legs were frozen and my lungs hurt and I couldn’t see half the time and took couple pretty spectacular spills.

Don't Sleep

2008-01-10T10:44:00.000-05:00

I seriously ought to reconsider my sporadic sleep schedule. Since the beginning of the work week I’ve pulled two all nighters, plus another one where I was up until 5 AM before finally deciding it was wise to try to sleep at least several hours before work. On these nights I have done the following:

Caught up in Bleach, Naruto, and One Piece in terms of episodes and manga
Re-read Death Note
Taken up GTA: San Andreas again, playing it probably 5 or 6 hours a day
Trashed my room to point where I can’t find the floor

Very productive indeed. Either way this morning I was still up around like 5-ish from reading Kubo Tite’s Zombie Powder, shame he didn’t finish it. The character design is almost identical compared to Bleach, and just as hilarious, with many of its characters reflected in the mangaka’s second series. So looking at my clock, I was faced with the dilemma of sleeping for 4 hours before waking for work, or going to the gym (not running outside in freezing weather). The gym won in the end and I was shocked to find the amount of people in the gym, though it was mostly middle-aged men. So, after returning from the gym at 7-ish I was determined to sleep for about 2 hours, but I was compelled to finish reading Zombie Powder (ran until chapter 27, then was cancelled), and by the time that was done it was near 8:30. So yet again, I am at work, and barely staying awake.

Fall Semester in Pictures

2008-01-09T10:59:00.000-05:00