Pick your battles

One Saturday we jumped in the car to head out to our weekend activities. While Jack was backing out of the driveway, I exclaimed: "oh, I forgot to bring the shopping bags and we need to of grocery shopping!" Then I started to recall how I gathered all the shopping bags in a pile, and left them next to the door, but in a rush to leave I forgot to take them with me. I then continued to complain how I always forgot about this, and it was so frustrating.

Jack said calmly: "take it easy, it's just some bags, they cost 10 cents each."

I thought about it and said: "That's true. It's not a big deal."

In our lives, it is really important to choose what to put our energy in, and focus on what's important, because we don't have energy for everything.

Quitting is easier than I think

I'm taking on the task of detaching myself from the internet. I had been doing so since last Tuesday when I saw a friend's Facebook posting saying she would be off from Facebook for a month.

Let me first mention that I'm basically addicted to the internet since my college years. Nowadays, I use email, Facebook, check news on Google news and Yahoo! I also shop online too much. I found that I had been too attached to my hand-held devices, and the ability to get online anytime, anywhere is too distracting for my work and life. Quitting the internet for me is difficult, like quitting any other kinds of addictions such as coffee, it may result to a nasty headache or other ailment.

However, I'm happy to report not only that I survived this challenge, I found the experience liberating and I truly believe I can continue to do it and improve my lifestyle.

First I wrote down my resolve:
No internet usage except for urgent emails and anything work related.
Duration:
Start with 1 week.
How is it done?
What is not allowed:
1) No blogging or reading blogs including no reading my own blog, which I do a lot.
2) Minimal email, only check and respond to urgent ones.
3) Absolutely no Facebook or wechat.
4) Absolutely no reading news from the internet.
5) No reading with ebook (this will lessen the temptation to do other stuff online.)
6) Absolutely no online shopping.

What is allowed:
1) Reading real/physical books, papers or magazines.
2) Writing notes on physical notebook.
3) Can use iphone for the following:
    - as a clock, alarm or timer;
    - listen to music from iTunes or radio;
    - calendar, notifications (should use calendar book if possible)
    - spending application
    - phone calls
4) Use the phone to call people instead of using email. Meeting with friends in person instead of using social network apps.
5) OK to check bank account information online to make sure it's balanced, but should keep to minimum usage.
6) Can access the internet and use email for work related tasks.

What to do instead:
- stretch, yoga, pranayama, meditate
- play with dogs
- walk/exercise
- pick up the house, cook, etc
- write notes down
- watch news on TV, watch movies
- think, and hang out with friends

I feel like I'm sealing up the leakage of energy this way. It helps stop my mind from wondering, so that I'm not being obsessed by news or anything else flowing on the "net", and stop news from chew me up emotionally. I had so much more time to spare and do the right things with it. Hack I'm sealing up my wallet too!

Now, back to la la land.

Why do I enjoy cooking?

 

Picture above: I made taco spice seasoning with garlic powder, onion powder, oregano, chili powder, paprika, chili flakes, and ground cumin. How I feel like a chemist when mixing the spices together according to the recipe, then cover the bottle and just shake it to mix the spices evenly.

The kitchen is like a lab for cooks, everything is possible, and anything can happen. The final results also vary greatly, and that's part of the excitement.

Today, after weeks of slacking off, I made dinner. I've been craving for baked spicy sweet potato fries for days, and I finally get to make it today. I like the recipe from allrecipes.com. I also made a spicy zucchini soup (from Rachel Ray via the food network.)

Sweet potato fries called for taco mix, so I made myself some by combining the individual spices I had.

The zucchini soup is very much like an Italian soup, but I had to make roast red bell pepper for the first time. I cut the bell peppers in half, cleared the seeds and stems, then put them on the cookie sheet face down. I was supposed to "broil it until the skin turn char," and I was patient to wait for it to happen, even though I was very doubtful about the method judging by the unfamiliar smoky smell from the oven.

The bell pepper turned out alight to my pleasant surprise. The rest is just sauté vegetables with Italian spice mix, then add tomato and roasted bell pepper to cook. Then I added chicken stock, more spices to taste, which include garlic powder, chili powder, salt and pepper.

Impressively, both dishes were well received! Even tho zucchini can be blend and sweet potato is not our household favorite. The key is in the spice, I guess.

On forget and forgive

I used to think its a general saying to tell people not to hold grudges for something others did to them, forget about those bad experiences, and forgive the enemies.

Some personal experience let me to augment this to: if I cannot remember the incident in which lead me to be upset at the person, then it's time to forgive that person.

Of cause that can also mean, if you cannot forget then you don't want to/have to forgive.

I'm sure everyone has his or her own interpretation. That's the beauty of living and learning.

Books which blew my mind

Last night on the way home I looked up some facts about novels, because I am venturing to read "War and Peace," and we were wondering what was the longest novel ever written. Something interesting I found was that Tolstoy didn't regard "War and Peace" a novel. I also got a link which showed the BBC big reads, which was a readers choice on novels. I looked at the top 200 and was amazed that I have read a few of the top 200 on the list and more in the list of 20.

Reading this list brought back fond memories of reading some of those books which blew my mind at the time I read them. They certainly shaped the way I view the world and how I live.

Here is my unordered list and my memories about them. It's hard to pick one or two favorite ones, they are so different!

Brave new world - read it for college humanities class. Amazed by the vision of the author.

Gone with the wind - one of the first English novels I read. Fascinated by the strength of Scarlet. Learned a lot about the civil war, the south and slavery. Quote to remember: I will not think about it now, I'll think about it tomorrow. One of my first favorite English book.

Grapes of wrath - love, love the writing. I remember reading some paragraphs out loud over and over again and enjoyed the beautiful writings as well as the imagery. Learned a lot about America during the Great Depression. Sadden but amazed at people's strength to survive.  My first favorite English book.

Call of the wild - love the passion in writing and in Jack London's style.

I read the following shortly after I started working and when I have free time to make up some reading assignments which should have been done in high school.

 1984 - Amazed and amused.

 Animal farm - Very intrigued. I remember finding the Chinese version of it online and asked my mom to read it.

 Catch 22 - I remember lying in my cheap costco futon reading this book and rolling around laughing until my belly started aching and had tear in my eyes, yet it was not a happy laugh. It was funny but sad. How could one write something that has such impact in people? Black humor it is.

 Atlas shrugged - Astounded for months. Fascinated by Rearden and Dagny and strived to be like them. Joined Atlas shrugged online fan club, but people in the fan club were biggots and had super ego who like to equate themselves to be the hero and heroine. After struggling a while, I realized that the book was too black and white when judging people, and did not allow any human flaw or weakness, which is not realistic.

 The fountainhead - fascinated by Howard Roark.

 The ugly American - liked it very much, amused.

 Ender's Game - first science fiction I read.

 Harry potter - beautiful writing, fascinating imagination. Good read.

 The hobbit - amazed at the author's imagination.

 Jane Eyre - very difficult to read with lots of unfamiliar vocabularies, but love the super romantic story.

  Slaughterhouse five - amazing writing style the flows like no other.

I read the following more recently and love them.

A brief history about nearly everything (none fiction)  - learn a lot. Humorous writing style. Fascination about the universe and how some of the scientific discoveries whereby mistake.

Clan of the cave bear - beautiful writing and use of words. Some good facts about prehuman existence. Fascinating.

Guns, germs, and steel (none fiction) - when I entered into a period of curiosity about Archeology, this book is satisfies my craving and more.

The girl with dragon tattoo - liked to read about Swedish (as I never know anything about them). Good read, very tough story. I rather enjoyed the last book in the series because she finally won.

Here be dragons - my recent favorite which was recommended by a local bookstore owner when I told him I was interested in European history. Epic love story!

There are various Chinese historic legendary books I read when I was a child which were amazing too.

Then it brings me to "War and Peace," which I'm only 10% done.

The Hobbit 3

Happy New Year! This happens to be my 300th blog posting.

Today's main event was dim sum at our favorite restaurant, which was delicious and long missed. Then we went to see "The Hobbit 3." The 3D showing was the perfect timing so I reluctantly agreed to go for it, thinking I could get dizzy. Actually that was a double reluctance, because I wasn't so excited about more Lord Of the Rings type of fighting, which was totally made up to be a contrived third movie just so some film makers can make more money. But I went.

Actually the none fighting part, which was basically the first half of the movie, wasn't bad at all. There was good character development, good plot, and the 3D graphics were excellent. As the inevitable fighting scenes start, I was very nervous and did not enjoy it.

I kept thinking, "OK, I get it, there is this big and impossible war, where lots of heads being chopped off. Why don't we skip to the end, where the Orcs defeated and Bilbo goes home?" Then I thought, "whoever in the right mind would enjoy any kind of fight like this?"

Oh, if you are going to watch the movie, don't miss out the awesome sketches at the credit. I'm still wondering if they are real hand sketches or computer generated. If they are hand sketches, someone REALLY did a good job! Note, I rarely use all caps in my blog.