Happy π Day

3.14. Today is Pi Day. = Awesome.  And... delicious.

I had both chicken pot pie and kahlua cream pie today.  At Marie Callendar's.  Mmmmm.

Anyway, this weekend went by pretty quickly. My roomie (the one i've gotten along with for the past 5 years) just found out that she has an interview w/ a pharmacy school... next weekend.  So we spent Friday after my work searching for a suit for her to wear to the shindig.  However, we didn't have a whole lot of luck in our quest for said outfit--we searched everywhere, yet it seemed like most stores only sell short-sleeved women's suits now, for the spring, which doesn't work at all, because they aren't formal enough/appropriate for her interview.  It seemed like wherever we went, the men's department had countless suits, and the women's... well, they only had like one or two different suits at each store, and they were tailored to fit the shape of older women.  Whenever my roomie would try one on, it'd look awful, as if she was wearing somebody else's suit, and the styles were all so huge and... square? Unflattering.  On top of that, suits are pricey, and if she's going to pay that much money for something, it might as well fit, right? [Especially since suit purchases don't go along with my "is it worth it" clothing concept.]

child in a giant hamster ball at the mall

If this whole biochem thing doesn't work out, maybe I will open a store that sells women's suits, exclusively.  The suit styles will be cut to fit various body shapes, and each cut will be available in different colors, so that you may mix and match different suit jackets with skirts and pants within the same "color family." In the back of the store will be a tailor shop, in case you want to pay a little extra to have your suit personalized even more.  My roommate said that many women only wear a suit once or twice every few years or so, so this shop idea wasn't viable.  I told her, "Well, it'd be a hell of a lot more times than you'd wear your average wedding gown, yet bridal shops still manage to flourish!" When you think about it: every year, young female college graduates will be looking for suits to wear to job/professional school interviews, so you'd have a regular influx of new clients.  Additionally, you have all of those professional women who need to wear business formal attire to work on a daily basis: lawyers, real estate, people in the higher ranks of law enforcement, etc.  I bet a good number of these ladies would be relieved to finally have a store dedicated to selling professional attire for women, versus having to spend weeks searching for something that is appropriately formal and will fit. It would make their lives sooooo much easier.

Anyhoo, my roomie and I finished off the night with some Mexican food, which I'd been craving for the past two weeks.  This idea worked especially well, since my roomie's Catholic and can't have any meat besides fish on Fridays; she got an order of shrimp tacos and I had a monster beef burrito. Plenty of horchata was consumed.

I slept in till mid-afternoon on Saturday.  It's weird-- during the week, I won't be able to fall asleep until 2, but will wake up automatically WAY too early each morning, at like 5am (i have my alarm set for 5:45).  I go through most weekdays feeling utterly exhausted, yet I'm unable to take naps, and no matter how earlier I go to bed, I will still lay there, awake, until around 2.  I'd thought I'd have adjusted my inner clock to my work schedule by now, but I guess my body's decided otherwise.  However, for some unknown reason, my body knows it can sleep in on weekends, and thus, I've been sleeping away most of my Saturdays.  Wasted time, to me. But then again, I guess my body needs this extra rest in order to make up for the damage it does to itself during the week.

One of my old TAs came down to visit/hang out/trade music late Saturday afternoon, which was pretty cool since we haven't really seen each other in, like, what? more than a year now?  Most of my friends think it's weird that I keep in touch with old TAs, but I don't think it's that huge of a deal. I mean, perhaps, maybe my sophomore year me (three years ago?) would've been weirded out at the idea of befriending my TAs (they were older, scary, and, well, teachers).... but I think somewhere in my junior year, I realized that they weren't all too different from their students (hell, they, too, are also students) and I began viewing them more as my colleagues rather than merely strict authorities.  I still look up to and respect them as I would anyone else, but it's more like an older sibling-ish admiration versus scary professor anxiousness. And plus, since most of them are a little older/grad students, I've found that they can be a valuable source of both academic and life advice, as well as music and, well, free beer.  Not too shabby, in my opinion.

After that, I went out with one of my band members to explore Pacific Beach ("PB").  I never really went "out" extensively while I was in college, as there simply wasn't ever enough free time to do so.  I've lived in San Diego for nearly five years now, yet there is still so much living that needs to be done.  I never really did much "living as a young adult," never explored the "bar scene" as a student (I turned 21 way after most of my other friends), and only went out to nightclubs or parties when I was absolutely forced to go by my roomies (they would get mad/not talk to me for days, weeks, even, for not attending their club outings... which I didn't feel any need to be a part of).

So, my band member and I went to get beers at a bar next to the beach-- I forget what the place was called, but it was tiny, crowded, and as loud as heck.  It was located on the second floor of some random building, above a small souvenir shop along the boardwalk.  The bar was filled with mostly guys, but there were a few girls there, who were all seemingly dressed in slutty leprechaun costumes. I felt really out of place.  It was really warm, and smelled of sweat. The floor was sticky from years of spilt drinks; it felt weird shuffling my toes along the insides my new shoes, w/ their soles cemented to the ground as I tried ordering a drink.  I wanted to try Old English, but, apparently, this bar doesn't carry any "hard" liquor, so, I got a Guinness instead. The place serves its beer in goblets.  I'd only had Guinness in bottles, before this night-- I'd have to say that trying Guinness from the tap was life-changing.  I don't think I can ever go back to drinking bottled beers.  Not too many of my friends like dark beers, but to me, light beers taste like watered-down coconut juice.  I can't stand that sort of blandness. The only beer that is worse than light beer is canned light beer.  That stuff is horrible.  I took a tour of a local brewery once, and learned that most commercial canned beer is made by shooting up syrupy beer concentrate with soda water. The beer companies can regulate alcohol content more easily this way, to help maximize profits.  It's disgusting.

Today, Sunday, one of my friends & old roomies, Jen, came down from Irvine to visit, and we went to see John Leguizamo perform his production, Diary of a Madman, at the La Jolla Playhouse. It was the first time I'd ever seen him perform live; I normally associate him with the movies he's been in, like Romeo + Juliet and To Wong Foo with Love... Funny guy. Although, shorter than I'd imagined he would be. The routine was about his life growing up in Queens and the personal and professional adventures he'd had through the past 4 decades.  After the performance, Jen and I met up with Megan (newly engaged) at Marie Callendar's, for free pie on Pi Day. Yum, pie.