I’ve posted yearly recaps since 2008. I’m a stickler for tradition so here’s my recap for 2011.

Previous years: 2008, 2009, 2010

I had a good year.

Note: All links open in a new window.

January

• Rang in the New Year at Speakeasy with Alan, Jennifer, and company.
• Had girls’ night in with crepes.
• Battled an eye infection for a full month. It was gross.

February

• It snowed.
• I didn’t see Alan often because of his work.
• BDF (Best Dudie Friend) visited Austin! This ended up being the only time I saw him this year.
• BDF surprised me with cookies. His note gets me Google search hits that make me a little sad.
• Sent out Valentine cards and socks to my girlfriends.

Alan and I hanging out

March

• Alan took me to my first NBA game, Heat vs. Spurs.
• BFF had cake balls delivered to me at work.
• My solemate (deliberate misspelling) visited Austin.
• Went to Austin’s 2nd Annual Bacon Takedown.
• Went to Sketchbook Project 2011 tour stop in Austin.
• Hosted my first giveaway on the blog.
• Attended a free screening and Q&A with director of Meaning of Tea, a fantastic documentary about tea. Really!
• Alan and I had a two part dinner to celebrate our three year anniversary at Haddington’s and Uchiko (my favorite restaurant).
• Attended Austin Food Blogger’s Alliance Launch Party and applied for membership.
• March was a turning point in my life. I faced myself in therapy. I’m still reaping the benefits.

At Sketchbook Project event

April

• Visited Houston for dad’s birthday.
• Did a month of video blogging everyday in April (VEDA).
• Had a pillow fight in Ikea.
• Puppet showed a conversation between my parents for VEDA.
• Alex, Hillary, and I met up in San Angelo, Texas for a girls’ weekend.
• Took my little (Big Brothers and Big Sisters) to see a presentation about being a teen parent.
• Alan and I went to a drive-in theater for the first time and saw Back to the Future. Drive-in was on my life list!
• Joined Austin Food Blogger’s Alliance.

Hillary, Alex, and Me at the San Angelo Library

May

• I got bangs impulsively, changing my do for the first time in 5 years.
• Took a canoe trip with coworkers, facing a handful of irrational fears very reluctantly. Obviously, I survived.
• I participated in Leo’s Habit Course and developed a palate for vegetables by eating one serving a day for 30 days.
• Flew to Boston to see BFF. We drove to New Hampshire, Vermont, and Rhode Island, all three were states I’ve never visited.
• Read 8 books this month.
• Totes Awesome Channel was founded.

June

• Went home to Houston for Father’s Day.
• Rolled down a hill inside of a ball.
• I hit a boulder with my car. I always hit non-moving objects. Anyway, this was the start of a chain of bumper problems during the rest of the year.
• I hemmed my first dress! As part of my new year’s resolutions, I wanted to do 10 learning tasks with sewing. This was my first major lesson.
• Went to third Annual Cupcake Smackdown

July

• Met Ashley D, Ashley, and Nicole of Totes Awesome Channel and recorded a vlog.
• Celebrated my 28th birthday simply with a dinner with Alan and then a movie and drinks with friends.
• Made my favorite video: 28 Life Lessons from 28 People (for my 28th birthday).
• I caught up to 2007 and got my first smart phone!
• My friend, Naz surprised me with a vlog from my dad.
• I got really cozy with Tennessee Williams and his movies. Cat on Hot Tin Roof is excellent!

Celebrating my birthday

August

• Successfully completed VEDA despite being out of town twice and moving!
• Met up Hillary and Alex in Dallas for our second girls’ weekend of the year.
• Moved in with Alan.
• Used my passport for the first time since renewing it 2007. Alan and I took a vacation to Vancouver, Canada, my new favorite city.
• Saw the bats in Austin for the first time.

In front of the Vancouver Aquarium

September

• Adopted Bob from a shelter.
• I went to some of my Ten Year Reunion and was pleased to see all my classmates have blossomed to beautiful women.
• Brandi and I attended Jessica’s wedding.
• With a lot of conscious effort, I averaged 6 hours of sleep in the month of September! (I’m usually sleep deprived.)

Class of 2001

October

• I had a fluffy cable TV show debut.
• Had my first blogger date with Treavor.
• Donned a borrowed construction hat and went as Heidi in Home Improvement for Halloween.
• Cindy visited Austin!

November

• Posted a blog post everyday in November.
• Ran two blocks of a 5k for Race for the Cure and raised 460 dollars. Thanks to a lot of you!
• Went to Texas Renaissance Festival with Brandi and Jessica. It was our third year going and we decided to only do new things. We threw knives, shot bow and arrows, and had our face painted. It was the first time I’ve ever had my face painted!
• Had my second blogger date with Treavor.
• Attended a We Are Girls conference with my little. It was incredibly insightful.
• Had a Thanksgiving picnic with friends at the park. We threw a whole cooler’s worth of ice cubes into an enormous fountain, to create ripples, to help push a soccer ball to a sad toddler across the fountain. We were successful.
• Had a progressive meal day with Kim, Thomas, and friends.
• During breaks between eats, we made paper cranes for Kim’s tree.
• My bumper nearly killed Kim and me and got us murdered in the woods.
• Made our sparkly tattoos dance.

December

• I decide to like Christmas. I discovered it took more energy disliking it than it does to give into the cheer.
• Partcipated in Austin Food Blogger’s food swap.
• I was without a car the whole time I was in Houston for Christmas (the bumper needed to be replaced) and was touched to have friends pick me up for dates.
• Sewed couch pillows with help from mom.
• Hosting a “Never Have We Ever” dinner party tonight. Post to come!

Bob hanging out with snowman

In writing this post, I realized this year was really sweet for relationships. It may have a lot to do with my prioritizing close friends over acquaintances and then learning to set boundaries. Recently, I’ve been in a funk about not having a life’s calling but I have to say, I’m really content with my tribe. Word on the street is that it’s the relationships that really matter.

Wishing you a terrific end of year celebration! Lots of love!

Making friends with people I routinely see is easy. Be along side someone everyday of the week and the chances of stumbling on some awesome commonalities go up. I think that’s why people label friends in their lives by venue. High school friend, college friend, neighbor friend, church friend, work friend, camp friend, Internet friend. We pay homage to the chapters and locations of our lives that made these friendships possible. As I’ve grown older and became more keen of life’s patterns, I recognized that most friendships don’t survive the ending of proximity. Most people I meet aren’t still in touch with their high school friends (My tiny high school and the friendships I see still fostered on Facebook are an aberration.) I’ve adored many coworkers but have managed to only keep 4-5 as friends after holding 10 jobs in my life time. I’m always saddened when I leave chapters not only because I know that life will be uncertain until I find my next groove, but also because I have to leave the people behind. There’s just not enough time and room for everyone you meet and share french fries with to continue on in your life.

My college friend, Deesh likes to remind me of that one time we took a final in our final semester in 2005 of college together. I had asked him if he thought we’d still be friends after college. He laughed because he couldn’t imagine it otherwise. Cynical, I just thought he was being a bit naive. Maybe he was, but it’s now been over 5 years since graduation and I’m having dinner with him Thursday. In September, I blogged that I was sad that Jessica moved away and got married and I mourned the loss of our friendship. Just a couple months later, we reunited for a weekend. Last year for VEDA, I watched 20-30 people post a vlog everyday for the month of August. It was our first year doing it and at the end, I thought, “Man, another chapter done. I probably won’t keep in touch with most of these awesome people.” Now I share a collab channel with four of the girls I met and tweet at a slew of them still. We make plans to meet each other even.

I wanted to take a moment and marvel at some of these friendships. My college friend Kym and I really just spent one summer together 5 years ago and yet I email her weekly. Kim and I met in 2001 in college and I email her DAILY and see her when I’m in Houston. Cindy and I only really shared a few months of living in the same town when we first met. I respect the importance and fond memories of friends whom life physically moved away and with them the friendship dissipated, but the friendships I managed to keep alive with emails, phone calls, chats, letters, and care packages, they really have a special place in my heart. You can say there’s no closer proximity than the friendships you carry with you.

This post is written in dedication to my BFF, a high school life friend.

Jessica, a close friend of Brandi’s and mine, moved away over a year ago. We saw her just once since then and it was at her wedding. A happy occasion but not the perfect time to catch up. We reunited finally over the weekend and traveled south for a day to attend the Texas Renaissance Festival. We’ve gone twice before. To put a fun spin on things, we decided to skip out on most of the activities we’ve done before (no more riding elephants!) and pick the attractions we’ve never done.

So we started with face painting. Even as a child, I’ve never had my face painted!

Then we shot bow and arrows. We picked the heavier bows. 27 lbs, when weaker armed individuals should start at 20 lbs. I don’t know what I’m talking about; I’m just repeating what the guy said. All I know is that I could barely pull the string back!

Then we threw knives. I’ve never thrown knives. Turns out, I throw knives like I throw darts. (Poorly.)

Of course we had to conserve some of our traditions. We ate the same foods and took photos with some characters!

It was an exceptional day.

Posted in my Xanga five years ago:

Wednesday, 25 January 2006

This is for Cindy who’s greedy for details.

I was in the little plane. Squished. My jump-master was to my left, the guy who would be filming me on the way down and two female professional skydivers to my right. We were all sitting on the floor. I felt like canned tuna.

I tried to keep my gaze off the CameraMan’s crotch. The harnesses gathered around the crotch and amplified a man’s area up to the point obscene. Gross.

I waited, waited, waited. It took forever to get up 10,000 feet. Jump-master tried to make small talk with me. His ex-girlfriend shared the same name as me. I wanted to bail when he said that. “Don’t unharness me to get back at your girlfriend.” Laughter. I feigned a mistrusting glare.

Altitude reached. Door opened. LOUD wind all around. The two female skydivers jumped out and they looked really cool jumping out. Movie cool. Then CameraMan stepped out on the step they had outside while holding on to the wing of the plane. He recorded me while I inched out. I scooted on my butt, the jump-master harnessed me to him, and we were at the door in no time. He shouted for me to put my foot on the step but I couldn’t. The wind kept blowing my legs like little Texan flags and I couldn’t firmly plant them. Jump-master ended up pushing us out of the plane.

I watched the DVD from this point on and I made the most unattractive and terrified face going out. The next few seconds were the most exhilarating seconds of my life. I tumbled about, spun, saw clouds every which way no matter what side was up. Everything was still loud. Windy loud. Piercingly loud. My goggles were not strapped on tightly enough so they were slipping off my face and pushing up against my eyes. Making me slantier than I already am. I’m Asian. Most of y’all are Asian [Referring to my Xanga readers]. We do not need help looking slanty. My right shoe was slipping off. I wish I didn’t have these wardrobe malfunctions because they distracted me from THE MOST EXHILARATING moment of MY LIFE.

Finally the chute opened and I get yanked up. It suddenly grew quiet. Just like Kim said. In her words, “it was very zen.” The first thing my jump-master said was, “Congratulations, you just fell 7,000 feet.” I laughed. My right shoe was now hanging on my toes.

The view wasn’t that great. Dry Texan dirt. But it was so peaceful floating. I already decided before my feet softly landed on the ground that this is something I want to do again. And possibly again.

I wanted to post this as a preamble to a post that’s in the works and also so I can have it stored on this blog.

Man, 5 years ago I was 23. Time has flown. (Get it?!)

Oh, contrary to what I wrote and thought, skydiving is not something I want to do again unless I do it at an amazingly beautiful location.

This past weekend, I attended one of the events (the most informal one) of my Ten Year High School Reunion. 23 of the 48 (two were not present during that photo posted above) showed up for the informal happy hour, some of whom I haven’t seen in ten years. It was so lovely to see everyone and I wished more of our class showed up.

There’s a popular notion that people show up to their reunion hoping to upstage old bullies and indulge in delicious schadenfreude. I’m pretty confident that our reunion was nothing like that. Everyone looked even better or the same as I remember them ten years ago. Cute and awkward girls have blossomed into glowing women. Everyone hugged all in attendance as soon as she arrived. It was a heartwarming experience and felt something like coming back to an old home.

The reunion reminded me that as a class and in comparison to preceding and succeeding classes, we were misfits. A perfect illustration of our class’s personality involves a Halloween tradition our high school had. We were a school for Pre-K through 12th grade. Every year for Halloween, the high school classes each had a hallway to decorate so that the Pre-K through 4th graders could parade through in their costumes. Normally, the hallways were decorated with the usual G-rated Halloween decorations. Ghosts and witches and scarecrows. During our sophomore year, our class decorated our hall as if it was a mental institution. We had REDRUM splattered in red on white walls and a stretcher with a classmate laying on it with her intestines hanging out. I remember we pulled a blanket over the intestines for the super young kids. We had lullabies playing and a strobe light flickering. We had girls muttering to themselves in wigs and grabbing kids from under the stretcher.

Needless to say, we broke the tradition after all the angry phone calls from parents.

We were a handful and I love the memories.

I know it’s impractical because of all the states we span (though a big chunk of us live in Houston, Dallas, Austin!), but I wish we didn’t wait ten years to reunite.

Originally, this VEDA entry was suppose to be a 1 to 3 ratio of sad story to funny stories. Unfortunately, I underestimated how long the sad story would take me to tell so I’ll have to lace in more happy entries for VEDA in the future. Tonight, I vlogged about my mom’s first birthday as my dad’s wife.