First the Worst

It's a little weird how many things can spring up at you in one day. After taking a fair amount of time to figure out how to see photos I'd taken, I discovered that there were roughly 30 others on the same card - remnants of vacations my family's taken in the past few years. Credits to my dad:

JAPAN! Wicked, eh? Very cool place, very cool people, funky driving habits. As in all of Asia, mopeds are more common than cars. There are a lot of roads that are half pedestrian walkways, half moped lanes, and the traffic lanes don't really make sense. BUT Japan's saving grace: despite the overcrowdedness, the language barrier, and the millions of people who seem to blow smoke right in your face, the ramen is amazing. Visit, eat, and send me a letter telling me how right I am.

Keeping with the asian-feel photos, here's a picture of the HSR in Taiwan (High-Speed Rail). It's a toned-down version of the bullet train. I used to detest traveling from Northern Taiwan (Taipei, where my grandparents live) to the South (Tainan and Gaohsiung, where my mother's side lives) because the train ride takes roughly 5 hours. Traveling by HSR, it takes less than 90 minutes to go from North to South. I went alone for the first time this summer; I was interning at a college in the South and went North for a few nights to visit the grand-folks. On my way home, I got on the HSR dragging 1. my backpack 2. a big suitcase 3. a box of presents from my relatives to my immediate family back home 4. a guitar that I decided to take back to America from my aunt's house (see upper right for photo confirmation of guitar). It was still a comfortable trip.

But to stay true to what this blog is supposed to be about, I'm going to start showing a few photos I took myself. They're not talented or artsy, but feel free to bolster my confidence by telling me otherwise:

Though normal at first glance, my desk is actually the result of multiple reconfigurations. I've tried speakers there, clock there, light over here - basically every possible arrangement of my trinkets. I think this one finally works. The only notable problem would be that there's a drawer on the left-hand side that I keep banging my knee on whenever I get out of my chair. I tried to maximize the amount of usable room while still keeping my laptop on the desk - the entire right side is space for when I'm working. Is it dorky to mention this? Probably, but my desk is still cooler than yours.

Finally, irrevocable proof that I do indeed have a BLACK iPod, as opposed to the pink one that I am forced to use. I actually jumped into a pool with the black one in my pocket a few years ago; while it starts and scrolls, I can't seem to get it to play any music.