Segwaying

Last night i rode a Segway all around downtown Austin, and it was soooooo fun! I was terrified to get on the thing, but after 5 minutes of "training," i was good to go. I sooo want one of these. After our rather long "ride," a small group of us went to Joe's Bar & Grill for some late eats and drinks. I got the mini burgers - four petit burgers on mini french rolls with gouda cheese. They were un peu disappointing, to be perfectly honest, but at the time i was so hungry that it didn't matter. Plus we all had a great time just chillaxin' after our hard workout. ;-) I was finally dropped off at my car, which was still in the One American Center parking garage, at around 11 p.m. As i started driving down the garage, i realized that my car was making some funky noises and that it was seriously pulling to the right. Great. Pulled over in front of the Stephen F. Austin hotel to realize that yup, i have a flat tire. GAH. Luckily the valets were soooo nice and changed my tire to the spare for me right on the spot. Now i have to figure out when and where i will take my car to get a new tire. But i have to be in court this morning for a hearing! AND i have an article due tomorrow. Who said working life wasn't stressful??

Happy(?) Memorial Day

I dedicated my yoga practice this morning to the soldiers of this country. In some ways, I am proud to be an American, despite my many endless complaints about the way in which we live. But I couldn't help but feel a pang of sadness and hopelessness about the troops in Iraq. No this isn't going to be a huge political, Bush-bashing, anti-war entry. I just want to send my love/support/sympathy/strength to those in Iraq and their families. I can't even imagine, and i thank God that i don't have to.

This morning's vinyasa class featured a guest teacher from Dallas who has her own studio on Oak Lawn. It was a great class - full of energy and breath and lots and lots of sweat. I really liked her teaching style and plan to visit her studio when i'm in Dallas.

BTW, what is it about yogis and tattoos? Two of the girls in this morning's class had full-back tattoos and one of them, who is also a teacher at the studio, just got hers. First off, OWWWWW. Second, is there some connection that i'm missing? I bet there is, and i should probably just google it, but it's so much easier to just ask. I do enough research at my job. :-)

Thank goodness the rain has died down, at least for now. I literally waded in a pool of water to my car this morning. (This is a terrible parking lot, poor L.C.) I have officially moved all of my valuables out of the Mansion, but i still have loads of stuff there that need to go to Goodwill, so that's my plan for later today. Hard to believe this lovely holiday weekend is almost over... Today will be lovely - mani/pedi, dinner with a friend, and getting ready for another work week.

OH! I finished Come Back this morning, SUCH a good book. Kind of unbelievable that it's not fiction. I really want my mom to read it, but it might be a bit much for her. Still i can't help but show her and be like, "SEE!!! This is mother/daughter relationship. You don't have it NEARLY this bad!! I'm a good kid - see see SEE!!! Love me. Things could be worse, and i'm glad they're not. Love me unconditionally. Don't give up on me!" But... she already knows that, i'm sure.

Saturdays in Bed

Mmmm today is delicious. I finally got to sleep in this morning, and it was heavenly. My body woke me up around 8:30 (my body and/or Puffin), but i refused to get up. I stayed in bed for 21/2 more hours, drifting in and out of sleep, playing with Puffin, thinking, dreaming, and reading. I've recently started a faabulous book, Come Back: A Mother and Daughter's Journey Through Hell and Back by Claire and Mia Fontaine. It's the story of a mother (Claire) and daugther (Mia) duo who have gone through... well, a lot. It's not fancy, it's brutally honest and provocative and sometimes really painful to read. I am loving it. I also started Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace...One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. I'm not having as much to leisure read as i had hoped, but once the j-o-b is over, and all i have to worry about (or not worry about, as seems to be my case) is summer school, i foresee hours and hours of endless reading.

After finally leaving the comfort of LC's bed, i donned my new yoga attire and headed to vinyasa. Ohhh how i've missed daily yoga. Just taking a couple of weeks off has really tightened me up, so i'm trying my best to carve out time in every day to practice. 90 minutes and a trip to Central Market later, i showered and crawled back into bed with my books. The afternoon has flown by; i can hardly believe it's already 4:20! I still need to move the rest of my crap from the Mansion and run a couple of errands, but the beauty of 3-day weekends is that you really can take a day off and spend Saturday in bed. Yummy.

I'm Baaaack

Um so i'm more than slightly concerned that the ad link on my blog is (or was) "Suicide Thoughts?" I mean what the heck, my entries have been so happy lately!! Sheesh. That being said, this will also be a tres happy entry because as i said earlier, life is going well. Found out i may be able to publish an article this summer, playing a large role in helping a woman open her own salon, have mostly moved in and am enjoying living in this cozy little condo, and i went to yoga tonight for the first time in weeks. It was difficult but oh so amazing... Just the smell and heat in the studio when i walked in was divine. Sadly i don't think my schedule will permit another class until Saturday. When did life get so busy?

Well let's see... Tomorrow morning i'm having an early breakfast with my mentor from last summer's firm at 1886 Cafe at the Driskill. Then i'm tagging along with a partner for a pro bono hearing, and i have plenty of new projects to keep me busy all afternoon. Thursday we have a happy hour after work, then having dinner with my BFF from college... Hopefully i will be able to take my poor car in sometime soon since the check engine light came on tonight, and it's shaking...badly. I really hope it doesn't die on the way to work tomorrow morning. Terrible timing!

Wow is it really already 10:20?? Must get some unpacking/cleaning done and hit the sack. Muah, darlings.

P.S. Went to Louie's 106 today for lunch and had the most amaaazing seafood risotto. Squid, scallops, shrimp and mussels in the most amazing white wine sauce. Fabulous.

Update

Overall, i would have to say that life is pretty good right now. I'm in my second week of work and still enjoying it, which is a good sign. My office feels more and more like home now that it's got some character. Framed pics of my family and Puffin, lavender scents, and colorful pens. (Don't hate - the firm's the one who gave me the colorful pens!) The other 2 clerks started today, and they both seem kind. It's nice to be the only girl because i get assigned all the girly projects, i.e. the salon.

I've finally moved out of the Mansion although there is still much to be done. Most of my clothes and shoes are still there, but slowly and surely i have been moving more every night. It's the only exercise i've been able to do for the past couple of weeks so i can't complain. Am hoping to make it to 6:30 vinyasa tomorrow night as i have not been to yoga in what feels like decades. I hope it doesn't kill me. Actually i kind of hope it does. Life coach's place feels more and more like home, although it's probably just because i keep adding more and more pink and Hello Kitty. What can i say? It has to feel like me. :-)

The bed and its new lavender-scented sheets are calling my name. Goodnight, my darlings.

Push to achieve tied to suicide in Asian-American women

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- One evening in 1990, Eliza Noh hung up the phone with her sister. Disturbed about the conversation, Noh immediately started writing a letter to her sister, a college student who was often depressed. "I told her I supported her, and I encouraged her," Noh says.

But her sister never read the letter. By the time it arrived, she'd killed herself.
Moved by that tragedy, Noh has spent much of her professional life studying depression and suicide among Asian-American women. An assistant professor of Asian-American studies at California State University at Fullerton, Noh has read the sobering statistics from the Department of Health and Human Services: Asian-American women ages 15-24 have the highest suicide rate of women in any race or ethnic group in that age group. Suicide is the second-leading cause of death for Asian-American women in that age range. (Watch more about Asian-Americans' feelings of pressure to hide depression )

Depression starts even younger than age 15. Noh says one study has shown that as young as the fifth grade, Asian-American girls have the highest rate of depression so severe they've contemplated suicide.

As Noh and others have searched for the reasons, a complex answer has emerged.
First and foremost, they say "model minority" pressure -- the pressure some Asian-American families put on children to be high achievers at school and professionally -- helps explain the problem.

"In my study, the model minority pressure is a huge factor," says Noh, who studied 41 Asian-American women who'd attempted or contemplated suicide. "Sometimes it's very overt -- parents say, 'You must choose this major or this type of job' or 'You should not bring home As and Bs, only As," she says. "And girls have to be the perfect mother and daughter and wife as well."

Family pressure often affects girls more than boys, according to Dr. Dung Ngo, a psychologist at Baylor University in Texas. "When I go talk to high school students and ask them if they experience pressure, the majority who raised their hands were the girls," he said.
Asian-American parents, he says, are stricter with girls than with boys. "The cultural expectations are that Asian women don't have that kind of freedom to hang out, to go out with friends, to do the kinds of things most teenagers growing up want to do."

And in Asian cultures, he added, you don't question parents. "The line of communication in Asian culture one way. It's communicated from the parents downward," he says. "If you can't express your anger, it turns to helplessness. It turns inward into depression for girls. For boys it's more likely to turn outwards into rebellious behavior and behavioral problems like drinking and fighting."

But Noh says pressure from within the family doesn't completely explain the shocking suicide statistics for young women like her sister.

She says American culture has adopted the myth that Asians are smarter and harder-working than other minorities.

"It's become a U.S.-based ideology, popular from the 1960s onward, that Asian-Americans are smarter, and should be doing well whether at school or work."

Noh added that simply being a minority can also lead to depression.

"My sister had a really low self-image. She thought of herself as ugly," she says. "We grew up in Houston in the '70s and '80s, and at that time in school there were very few Asian faces. The standard of beauty she wanted to emulate was white women." In college, Noh's sister had plastic surgery to make her eyes and nose appear more European-looking.

Heredity, Noh says, also plays a role. She says in her study, many of the suicidal women had mothers who were also suicidal. She says perhaps it's genetic -- some biochemical marker handed down from mother to daughter -- or perhaps it's the daughter observing the mother's behavior. "It makes sense. You model yourself after the parent of the same gender."
As varied as the causes of depression, Noh says she saw just as many approaches to overcoming it.

While some women in her study did seek help through counseling and prescription drugs, most of her subjects were ambivalent or even negative about counseling. "They felt the counselor couldn't understand their situation. They said it would have helped if the counselor were another Asian-American woman."

These women found help through their religious faith, herbs, acupuncture, or becoming involved in groups that help other Asian women.

"It shows the resourcefulness of these women," she says. "They had really diverse healing strategies."

Already??

Mother's Day weekend has been fantastic, fabulous, but entirely too short. I can't believe I have to go to work tomorrow! Seminar paper is pretty much done, just needs some editing. Tomorrow night is dinner at Uchi, then hopefully editing my paper and watching a movie with friends. I love that 2L year is officially OVER!

Dinner @ Vespaio was delish - stay tuned for a review...

Happy Mother's Day!

Sucks To Be Me

1 more final and a seminar paper... the end is near!! That being said, it really does suck to be me right now. Everyone else is all kinds of finished! AND while most people will be enjoying a petit break between school and work, i sadly will not be... It's off to work at 8:30 a.m. on Monday, May 14th for me. Oh well, c'est la vie. At least Mom and Jenn are coming on Saturday night for Mother's Day festivities! I am beyond excited about all that we have planned. My plan is to finish and turn in my seminar paper on Friday night (post Employment Discrimination exam - yech) so that i can spend all day on Saturday preparing for their arrival. That means an intense and thorough cleaning of our somewhat disgusting excuse for a house, giving Puffin a bath (not looking forward to this one), buying fresh flowers and plenty of coffee for Mommy, washing extra sheets and blankets, hiding all my um... not-Mom-friendly items, and of course, putting together their delicious surprises. Yay!

They'll be arriving late Saturday night so i'll prepare a petit snack for them since they'll probably be eating a crap dinner on the road. We'll be spending Sunday morning @ Viva Day Spa enjoying the following:

Spring Fling Spa Package- Start out by detoxifying in our Infrared Sauna and feel your tensions melt away- Using a dry brush, the body is exfoliated to increase circulation and lymphatic flow- Next, a One Hour Swedish Massage with Aromatherapy - Hot Herbal Steam Towels are applied on the body throughout the massage- Receive a stimulating express Foot Reflexology treatment to clear any energy blockages- Followed by a Lavender Body Wrap to calm the skin and senses- While wrapped, Cool Cucumbers are placed on the eyes while your scalp is gently massaged- Next receive a tingling Rosemary/Mint Scalp Treatment to relieve stress and hydrate the skin- Ending with hot Jasmine Tea

Then we'll probably have a nice light and healthy lunch (any suggestions?), and then head up to The Domain so that we can buy Mommy her present - a gorgeous Louis Vuitton bag that you can see here http://www.eluxury.com/browse/product_detail.jhtml?styleid=11422524&SectionID=6000. I realize it's un peu expensive, but it is beautiful, and my mommy deserves it!! Then it's church at 5 p.m., a 6:30 dinner @ Vespaio, then spending quality mother-daughter time and getting me ready for work! Monday is work then an early dinner @ Uchi before saying goodbye. :-(

OMG just got FANTASTIC NEWS!!! My friend Mili (actually my sister's friend from college, also a bridesmaid, and i LOVE HER!!) just told me that she got a job as the New Products Manager @ LOUIS VUITTON!!!!!!!! I mean... no words can describe how i feel right now. Her office is right next to the flagship store on 5th avenue too. I am definitely planning a visit. :-) CONGRATULATIONS, MILI!!!

Oooh so Damien Rice was fabulous in every way possible. He sounds even better live than on CD, and very few artists can pull that off. The concert was harder than i expected, and surprisingly, i totally dug it! Amazing lights as well. He opened with 9 Crimes on the piano (missed Lisa sniff), did a piano version of the "Fuck You" song which was incredible, sang Cannonball acoustic and w/o the mic, and ended drinking a glass of wine and singing/acting out "Cheers, Darlin." Fantastic fantastic show, and i can't think of better people with which to spend such an evening. He's on the list for ACL 2007 so buy your tickets now if you've never seen him live.

P.S. Was tres tempted to buy a t-shirt b/c they were ridiculously cute, but i'm proud to say that i decided against that $30 expenditure b/c let's be honest, i never wear t-shirts. Yay for restraint.

P.P.S. Look at this tragic story about how two vegan parents were sentenced to life in prison for starving their baby. :-( http://news.aol.com/topnews/articles/_a/vegans-sentenced-to-life-for-starving/20070509155909990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001. It's people like that who give vegans a bad name. Poor child...

Beaucoup de Good News!

1. I did not fail my ADR exam this morning!
2. My Hello Kitty yoga bag and yoga towel have finally arrived from Taiwan today, and they are even cuter in person!! Was afraid that my ginormous mat wouldn't fit, but it does! YAY!!
3. I'm going to see Damien Rice tonight - my first time seeing him live. I hear he's phenom. I have no doubt! Will update later tonight.

XOXO

Sweet Money!!

I just remembered, or was gently reminded, that i will be attending the Damien Rice concert here in Austin on Wednesday, May 9, right after 2 back-to-back finals. This is faaabulous news, as i have never seen Damien Rice in concert, and i will definitely be needing a nice chill escape from all things law-related for at least a few hours. Bliss. Sheer bliss.

P.S. Am secretly hoping Chris Tomlin makes an appearance in the audience. I think he's a D.R. fan, don't you?

Won't You Be My Clementine?

I really adore Clementine. The bright colors, the windows, the pink bathroom doors... it's all lovely. The service, however, leaves something to be desired.... namely... kindness? Friendliness? A small smile, perhaps?

Remember When

Remember when you were a kid? Fearless, flexible, and totally fine with taking a fall? I used to be a balance and monkey bar whiz, spent every recess period twisting and hanging and balancing. I was also an expert cartwheeler, backbender, etc. What happened? Age. School. Weight. Blech.

Today I attended my first yoga workshop: Detox & Recharge with Hannah Emlen at Castle Hill Fitness. It was 2.5 hours and yes, quite detox-y. At one point we were instructed to do a series of handstands. Um... handstands? Are you sure you don't mean... headstands? Cause i mean, i've been practicing those! I can headstand against the wall all DAY, woman, but i have yet to try a handstand. Well, it can't be that hard right? I pulled my yoga mat towards the wall, asked for a little assistance, and then proceeded to kick up. Um... handstands are hard. They are nothing like headstands, and they realllllly make you realize just how pathetically weak your upper body is (in my case, at least). So i had to modify - turn around place hands on ground and walk feet up the mirror. Even that wasn't as easy as i'd hoped. Blah, yoga's hard.

After the workshop i felt light-headed and starving so i hurried over to Whole Foods, bought about $15 worth of salad bar and a huge liter of water, and went home to eat, shower, and recover. My nausea took awhile to subside, and i became increasingly exhausted so a short (ok, long) nap was in order. So now that i've spent all day sleeping, yoga-ing, then sleeping again, i am trying my hardest to get at least a few hours of interrupted studying (aside from this blog entry, of course) in. I have no doubt that falling asleep tonight will be a breeze.. for some reason, my body wants nothing but yoga and sleep. Pas bien for the student...

P.S. To the anonymous commentor - i have seen that Hello Kitty laptop deliciousness! But yes, it is un peu extreme, and i haven't the time or energy to devote to such a project. Sigh.