Browse Month: February 2007

A Beautiful Evening on a Yacht

DSC_4147.jpgJason and Jia married aboard the Camelot last night in Newport Beach. The day started with lots of last-minute activity and lots of photo-taking. The boys got dressed at our house while the girls got ready at The Fairmont. The hotel was quite nice and made a good backdrop for their formal photos. Later at the Camelot, family started to arrive and more photos were taken. As guests arrived, there was a lot of excitement in the air in anticipation of a lovely evening on the water. Jia looked so pretty and Jason was pretty pumped up. As soon as we departed the dock, the wedding ceremony began. There were plenty of cheers and photo flashes as the wedding party walked down the aisle. Dad’s sermon was lengthy but very touching and gaves us a couple chuckles. In the end, the youngest Lao got married and we gained a new family member. Afterwards, there were more photos, hors d’oeuvres, and then dinner. The end of the night was a little rushed with such a short amount of time left for the cake cutting, toasts, and a little dancing but we all had a great time. Great job on the toast, Jes. And congratulations to Jason and Jia! Here are the photos.

Oh yeah, Happy Chinese New Year!

Question of the Day #9

I’m in the middle of a research seminar today and the topic of the year is “Self-Regulation”. So this brings me to the Question of the Day…

Question of the Day #9:
When you’re in a long boring meeting, how do you keep yourself alert/awake?

My Answer:
I have to drink something or write. Eating helps too. Haha.

mini-victory

There was no post this morning because I was little distracted. It all started on Thursday afternoon – right before I left for Vail.  It involved a high profile case that involved a family that hired an attorney who totally ripped our psychologist to shreds and then went after me until I had to leave the meeting early.  So, I assumed that I was going to get squashed today for the remainder of my report.  But he ended up having no questions for me. Boo…I studied for nothing. I was even ready to draw diagrams on the dry erase board and everything!

Anyway, this attorney basically said that our assessement was crap and so were the goals that we proposed for his client (a 3.5-year-old student). Out of the 17 goals that we proposed, he accepted only one and it was mine! Woo hoo!! Too bad my other two were not. Anyway, I came out of the meeting simply pissed because he had wasted 3 hours of my life that I’ll never get back. When I got back to my school, the staff couldn’t stop raving about my performance and how I stood up to Mr. Obnoxious Man. I felt like a hero that defeated the evil villain that was attacking our school. It didn’t even phase me but I guess if I made that much of an impact I should celebrate my victory. Now that I made it out alive, I’m making it a learning experience in my book of professional growth. I had always heard about this man who is notorious around the county. Now that I know how he plays the game, I’ll be ready for the next one. So, I enjoyed a glass of wine with dinner to celebrate the mini-victory that I had after a week’s worth of stress and anxiety leading up to today’s meeting. I’m just sad that out of all of this, the poor little girl who needs help is delayed another week from her therapy because her parents are too retarded to make their own decisions.

Question of the Day #8

Happy Valentine’s Day!  Since I work in a school, I can’t help getting bombarded by hearts, valentines, and candy.  That brings me to the Question of the Day…

Question of the Day #8:
What’s your favorite candy and why?

My Answer:
KitKat – because it’s crispy and sweet at the same time.  I like to nibble all the chocolate off first and then eat the wafers layer by layer.  Yep, I’m weird.

Question of the Day #7

I’m back and so is the Question of the Day!  When we were in Vail, we had lots of ice cream.  They had some pretty fancy flavors but I have my old favorites.

Question of the Day #7:
What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?

My Answer:
It has to be coffee ice cream but cookies and cream is a close second.  When they’re put together for mud pie ice cream, that’s even better!

Home Again

DSC_3717a.jpgToday started before the sun woke up. The alarm went off at 6 am and it was snowing outside!! The driveway and car was covered in snow and we actually had to scrape the windows. Our flight was at 8:00 am but we had to drive 30 miles in the snow without crashing, fill-up the tank, return the rental, check-in our bags, and get through security. Luckily we made it and the crappy Cobalt got us there safely. The snow was so awesome. It made me so sad that we had to leave. The mountain today would have been even better than yesterday.

Once we boarded, the captain announced that there wasn’t enough visibility to take off. So, we actually had to sit on the plane (at the gate) for another 30 mins. For some reason, it wasn’t bad. We watched the beginning of Superman Returns on Jes’ laptop and when it was time to take off, we got to watch the plane get de-iced by a dude in a contraption with a big hose to spray the de-icing solution. I must say it was quite entertaining to watch the snow melt right off. Call me a simpleton but watching the snowplows on the runway was really cool too.

The flight from Vail to Denver was short (minus all the weather waiting) and we didn’t miss our connection. In fact, we had another hour and a half to kill so we had some steak sandwiches and I wandered around taking some photos. On our two-hour flight from Denver was uneventful and we were home by 1 pm.

I had a three and a half day weekend and the Colorado snow did not disappoint afterall.  Here are the photos.