Tron; Chinese New Year; Mia at Biscayne Super Bowl Party; Market America

Haven't posted in over month. The last few weeks have been ridiculous. Finally got to watch Tron on the 22nd and it was a great movie (not Dark Knight or Avatar awesome but still quite good) with the special effects and musical score by Daft Punk. Seeing Olivia Wilde in that black spandex bodysuit is almost worth the price of admission. She's actually single now...

The following week I went to the Mirrodin Besieged Prerelease for MtG, where I didn't do very well. I've been in a slump lately, winning nothing, and seeing my DCI rating go nowhere. Later this month I'm actually going to play in a tournament for some money, up to $5000 in prize money. We'll see how that goes. Thing is, there's also a medical convention that weekend.

The 3rd was Chinese/Lunar New Year and I was expecting a couple old high school friends in town. Met up with one of them at a Chinese New Year party at Hilton in Downtown Miami since the other one was stranded back in CA due to crazy storm of the century blasting most of the country. On that Thursday night we went out to grab a late bite, and I learned good lesson after trying to drive back to the Extended Stay Hotel. Next time I better find the address of where someone is staying before I embark because there are many Extended Stay locations in a city. Took over an hour to find the place, which was rather embarrassing. Guess the only excuse I have is it was rather late.

On Saturday I went to the Market America World Conference at American Airlines Arena. The day was interesting, and I got to see Eva Longoria on stage. Later that night, we all partied at Nikki Beach till past 2 in the morning. I didn't get home till after 5 AM (Sunday morning) because I was so tired driving home. That actually turned out to be a 19-hour day, considering I woke up at 8 and I actually didn't sleep until 3 AM Saturday morning/Friday night from playing Magic. Super Bowl Sunday was even more awesome. Got up a little past 10, got ready, and headed off to the Doubletree Hotel near the airport to pick up my two friends. We headed off to South Beach for lunch on Ocean Drive, then hung out at the beach for a couple hours. Was planning on going to the Heat/Clippers game that afternoon but no matter because what would happen later that evening would make my night. I took them to Mia at Biscayne for a Super Bowl Party that I was invited to by Mister USA (who actually quit our program, which I'll explain later). It went down as a night to remember, as I basically got to meet quite a few models who were there for a mini pageant that was supposed to be held in Dallas but had to be relocated last minute, which worked out for moi.

I found out this last Thursday that Mister USA quit our residency, or rather, his internship. The consequence of that? Well, I became collateral damage because I got bequeathed multiple call shifts since I'm the person on backup for the week. So in one day, I tripled my call shifts. Oh well, guess that's my payment owed for the VIP partying, meeting multiple models, including Hillary Fisher.

Here are some photos from a week ago:

Congrats to Hillary who won that night. Packers also won but I really didn't care. I should probably thank Mister USA for that night.

Hope everyone had a nice Valentine's Day. As usual, it was SAD for me.

1-11-11!!

Guess what day today is? If you can’t figure it out yet, read the title of this post. And know what’s even cooler? 11:11:11, which just passed about an hour ago Eastern time, and will soon pass Central time. And for those of you on the West Coast, that’ll soon occur =) Next palindrome will be in 11 days. By the way, November will have several palindromes this year.

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On the 19^th of December, I went to my second Dolphins game, which was also my second NFL game. This time we did some extensive tailgating, but ended up missing the tipoff and jet flyby again. The game was alright, though a disappointing game by the home team. It was the worst display of field goal kicking I have ever seen. All Dan Carpenter had to do was make one of his four field goal attempts. Dolphins eventually lost by 3, but my two friends from Buffalo liked the end result so the drive home was good for them. I didn’t want an unpleasant group of passengers. My friend Katie tells me it was the first time in 5 years that the Bills have won in Miami.

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The following night, or rather early morning of the 21^st, there was a lunar eclipse, which I couldn’t catch since it occurred at 3 AM haha! Guess I could’ve stayed up all night.

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I flew back home to LA on Christmas Eve and my flight was rather interesting. Upon first boarding, while I walked to my seat, I noticed my window seat occupied by a little boy with his brother and mother next to them. She started to talk to me in Spanish, explaining how she would like to have me switch seats with her son (good thing I understood some of it). I replied in Spanish, “Yo no se,” which means “I don’t know” because I wanted to ask the stewardess. I ended up accepting of course since I couldn’t really refuse at that point right? So after taking my new seat, this guy next me started talking to me, disclosing how his last name is Chung and some mistake him for being Chinese. Minutes later, I find out he’s a Korean actor. At about the same time, the same stewardess from earlier comes by to hand me a free comfort pack because I agreed to swap seats with the kid. Cool how I got something out of it. So I end up sleeping for most of the flight. After landing, while I was waiting for my brother to pick me up, I heard someone calling me from behind. I turn around to see Albert and Anandit from my med school days. What a small world. We chatted for a few minutes before going on our separate ways but was nice running into them unexpectedly. 

So during my week break I basically spent time with family and friends. Ate out several times, and ran into an old high school friend twice in the same day, unplanned haha. Main blemish was seeing my Lakers lose to the Heat on Christmas Day haha, but overall, didn’t do much because I started having a headache from the time I got off the plane on Christmas Eve until New Year’s weekend when I flew back. At first I thought it was jet lag but couldn’t have lasted that long. Anyhow, didn’t celebrate as much as I wanted to but hope everyone had a nice holiday season. Happy New Year! Main resolution: turn in this blasted application for medical license.