DONE.

I sense this semester will be very very very interesting.

Less than 24 hours left until the CHI 2006 deadline 5 pm PST January 13th. This was the day I was waiting for or the day I have been dreading. One works in progress to submit. One student design competition to submit. And soon it will be done.

Unless they are accepted.

I e-mailed my housemate from last semester, asking where she left her key.

The first e-mailed bounced. Perhaps, her hotmail account was full. So I e-mailed again a couple hours later. I finally got a reply the following day. She said she \”had left a New Year\’s card with the key inside tucked in your bedroom door\”.

Tucked in my bedroom door??? I spent the next hour rummaging through my room, wondering how it could have gotten lost. Was she bluffing? Did she think she left it, but didn\’t really leave it?

Eventually, Ray my other housemate got home from the airport. And surprise surprise, it was in his room. What amuses me and piques my curiosity is how my housemate got our rooms mixed up despite her living in the house for the last 4 months. Furthermore, the card was on his desk so she must have went inside his room (despite the door being closed) and placed it on his desk.

I did remember her mother (one of those random where-is-my-daughter-i-don\’t-call-before-coming drop-bys) once asking me whether Ray and I lived together upstairs. Ignoring the allusion, I just said that yes my room was upstairs and left it at that.

Today, I watched Lost after almost a whole year break from it. Then during the climax of the hour, the power went out and I was in darkness.

Is there…something…saying something?

Debates. Arguments. Discussions?

Several years ago, I would get into debates about the most trivial things. There was one argument I got into about whether a cordless phone should be placed on its base all day long. He said that phones should be placed elsewhere for battery purposes. I said that the base was not designed that way and should not be used that way. What a stupid argument that was.

Sometimes it\’s an intellectual challenge, but most times, it\’s not. It\’s dividing people, making them more extreme in beliefs than before. People take it personally.

Those people with dignity, you know those charismatic and admirable ones, somehow avoid these topics together. In social situations, it\’s easier to let someone who believes in a cause win. Because ultimately talking about a belief makes one feel important. Why steal the spotlight even if we know the belief is wrong? Just give a benefit of doubt, because in the end, a disagreement is not worth it when it ends in hurt feelings.

I used to love conflict and drama, but it\’s tiresome.

I know someone who hates the Bay Area with a passion. I can see why, but I defended the benefits. But he continued to rant. I could never convince him otherwise, but I wasn\’t there spending time with him to argue. Friendship was the reason I was there. Just let him have the spotlight. Let him win despite a personal disagreement. Let him get out it of his system.

This comes from a philosophy that anger is misplaced energy. But when is it ok to debate in something you believe in? When it involves personal relationships?

Need i say it? Macbooks.

A 7 hour flight with a stop in Atlanta, a feeling of drowsiness, a $24 Italian dinner, 4 clunky bags, running around the airport because Sprint does not work, a $1 airport parking later…I am back in Pittsburgh!

My favorite freeway? The 24. (Not just because I am a fan of 24…)

People have often called this the rich man\’s freeway because it links 680 and 880 together through the Caldecott Tunnel where no trucks carrying hazardous materials are allowed (they can explode). As a result, most of the vehicles here are passenger cars. The luxury kind. Usually people from the Lamorinda area.

Today, I drove to San Mateo (note to self: showing up a person\’s door in an apt building even with prior warning the night before is still very surprising in our day of cellphones), Mountain View (buffet lunch at Passage to India; amazing mango soft serve), and Palo Alto (I got to help my friend pack by carrying bags to the car and lifting a vintage bathtub) again. The third time this winter break and the second time this week. For some reason, this time, I was too tired. Evidence that I probably can\’t endure a commute back and forth from the East Bay to the South Bay. Three summers ago, I had an internship in Santa Clara and hated the commute in the dry heat.

I like the way the 24 winds around the rolling hills as if I am going into the country. The way I can exit the freeway and go straight onto a road when the light turns green. And how, the dark streets (no streetlights where I live) give that sense of comfort that I am home.

Of course, this is all indication that I have grown to love what I grew up with. We miss the festering wound when it finally heals. We say to ourselves that the reason we miss it is because it made us more alert and that it made us feel real. But that\’s not the case, we just can\’t handle change.

Take the fruit of a neighbor\’s tree?

When my dad was in graduate school in Davis, he went to the campus fruit orchards with a few friends at night to pick fruit. Apparently they were caught once, but that hasn\’t stopped the urban foraging that is in our family.

When we were young, my sister and I went for \”adventures\”. In a \”ravine\” nearby, we picked blackberries. On routes throughout the neighborhood, we found ripe plums and loquat trees. The well-kept treasures were the guavas, easily hidden in the greenery. After living in Lafayette so many years, everyone in my family knows where the closest fruit trees are. We should start something like fallenfruit.org

As I grew older, I lost my thick skin. My parents apparently haven\’t. They have asked neighbors if they could pick loquat or the plums. And according to city ordinance, any part of a tree leaning over a fence to public property is free to the public. There\’s still questions of whether fruit on the tree can be picked. But nonetheless, my parents today stopped by a tangerine tree brimming with small orange fruits. They filled up a bag they happened to have in the car.

Save a penny now, save a dollar in the future? Another man\’s trash is another man\’s treasure? Sometimes. Most of the time, I would rather pay $4.99 for a box of tangerines than to suffer through the anxiety of being \”caught\” by the owner.

Right now, the lemon tree in the front yard is full of fruit. We have too many. Too bad nobody can see our lemon tree from the street. The bane of a private driveway.

Advice for a trip to the Peninsula/South Bay from the East Bay: leave the East Bay around 10:30 am (bypass the Caldecott buildup that happens at 11), take someone\’s FastTrak pass, and leave for the East Bay late late late at night.

Every time I drive (especially long drives), I wonder what would have happened if I decided to take the right lane, if I decided to take the other exit, if I took the wrong path. It\’s as if my life has been split into two? How would my life be divided into alternate paths? What if I made a decision that impacted my life in other ways?

How would the Jenn that took the right exit turn out? The same, happier, better, or sadder?

I drove to the Peninsula and the South Bay for the second time this winter break. After almost 2.5 years, I met up with a friend for lunch in Palo Alto. She was one of those friends I had made as a result of an ex. We gossiped about how he was a jerk and bonded well as a result. It was nice seeing someone after so long, but yet always picking up where we left off. Even if she is from Stanfurd.

Then I went with Carol and Dave (and his gf) apt-hunting around Sunnyvale and Mountain View. Surprisingly, I was shocked that the apartments there (at least the one we looked at) looked just like the places in Berkeley. Small and a touch of old. Furthermore, the rent was high. A two bedroom was going around $1300/month. My room in my parents\’ house in Lafayette is so much bigger. After living in such small spaces in college and grad school, I envision my place of living to be…expansive. A bedroom of my own. An office of my own. A sufficient kitchen and a real dining area. A living room. At least. I don\’t want to live in the same style I lived while at Berkeley. I split a one bedroom with a housemate then, me with a living room with only my shoiji screens providing privacy. No more of that.

And then to San Mateo to see friends from my grad program. Even if it\’s a totally different place, a state, everything was…as if nothing had changed. And it was nice for that one moment.