Wow, so apparently, now that my blog migration is complete, it seems I’ll be writing a new post every few days. Lucky for you… Nah seriously, I can just feel an entire truckload of issues piling up. Perhaps it’s the end of the quarter. Or maybe I’m just fucking due for a third quarter-life crisis… is that even possible? Oh fuck, that’s right: I’m 33. Guess calling it a quarter-life crisis is far too euphemistic. So fine, third-life crisis. It’s time.

The thing is, I spent a lot of time online the past several days. Yeah I know, aren’t I already online 24/7? True but what I’m trying to say is, I spent many hours reading about other people’s lives. This guy I knew in Shanghai. He’s a writer. He’s getting a book published. His wife is a superstar corpo. They have 2 adorable mutts, and they live in the French Concession in Shanghai. They document their lives with writings and with gorgeous photos. I wish I were them. I wish I had photos to document such a rich and vibrant and luscious life, but I don’t. I take crapass photos and I also look insincere or deformed in my photos. Seriously, you have no idea how many hours I have spent trying to “learn” how to be photogenic. My conclusion? It cannot be learned by me. My face just isn’t shaped right.

Then the other day on twitter, I came across a travel blogger. Not even 30 years old, she has traveled the world four times over. And she had turned her passion into her job. She’s a perpetual observer, learner, traveler. I wish I were her.

Last night, I got a LinkedIn update about someone I knew in Shanghai. She had been a “tai tai” until her boyfriend of eight years left her. Then, she moved to Hong Kong, and now a mere four years later, she is running her very own PR company. Her site has all kinds of crazy pictures of swanky parties, fashion events, celebs. Uber posh. How fucking glamorous and thrilling to run your own successful company and wine/dine with beautiful people at fancy places in HK? I want to be a hipster corpo too! Man, maybe I’ve been watching too much Entourage. I’m just sayin’…

“You can be whatever/whoever you want to be.” Is that really true? Does that really apply? I mean, aren’t some people just destined to live safe, boring lives? Sure, some might argue that John and I up and left for Shanghai back in 2003. We were adventurers. True, but god, that was six years ago. What have I done in the last year that has even moderately impresses myself? or that convinces me that I am alive and not going through the motions? Ugh, it’s so difficult not to sound like a spoiled brat. I know I am surrounded by love but still, I find myself wondering: is there more? These people who trigger my insecurities… certainly, they are happy. How could they not be?

What’s it going to take?

Yeah figures I would try to blame my recent emotional instability on new meds… Well, I guess it’s just a hunch, but I DID just switch to a new BCP on Sunday (if you must ask, you don’t deserve to know).

Anyway, I was sitting at my desk this morning and my eyes suddenly filled up with tears. Yes, it was one of those days… when I hate people. I felt so strongly misanthropic today that I almost threw up. First it was a post the other day from my friend in Asia– insane animal cruelty where someone jammed a wooden stick down a poor dog’s throat and tied him to a metal rail. The picture is heartbreaking. Seriously, wtf is wrong with people? Makes me so sick to my stomach. Then this annoying news about Jesse James. John says he wasn’t surprised: “just look at the guy.” But it’s not just about Jesse James. It’s about men creeping left and right. Yes, women do it too, but by and large, I think it’s fair to say men started this whole game and they are definitely in the lead. But whatever. I just don’t get the infidelity thing. Get over your fucking self. You’re not the shit; you’re just an asshole: a selfish prick who thinks it’s ok to treat people you “love” like shit. Wel, fuck you. Yeah, just thinking about this gets my blood boiling. Then the last straw? Last night. The goddamn evening news. CalState East Bay professor busted for raping a 13-month old baby, AND the baby’s mom was in on it. I just cannot wrap my brain over any of this bullshit! It’s the frickin’ Duke official all over again! What the hell is wrong with this world? I just can’t take this anymore. I can’t take it.

So yeah basically, I was a veg most of the day at work. Frickin’ on the verge of tears. Luckily, I salvaged some of the afternoon after my new book arrived, and it got me working on the next steps for my dogs at work proposal…

I’m feeling better now. I had a long soak in the hot tub, and then I gave both dogs a bath (did you know bathing a dog removes 85% of the allergens for people who are dog-allergic?). I’m feeling old today. John and I were just realizing that our 7-year wedding anniversary is coming up next month. Now we’ll have been married longer than we had been dating before marriage. I still can’t believe how young we were when we met: just a couple of kids, really.

John came down for lunch today. We were at Pizza My Heart, and at noon, the place was swarming with teenie boppers. God, they sounded young when they spoke. Boy, at 20, I was convinced I had this world figured out. Sigh. So innocent and naive and idealistic back then. That really was ages ago.

Last weekend, John and I went to Lake Tahoe with a group of friends. We headed out late Friday night and arrived in the mountains very early the next morning. It was snowing/icing/hailing, and “chain control” took a good hour to pass. The theme of the weekend was physical exertion. Seriously, I need some new friends– preferably ones who do not set personal goals of doing marathons, triathlons, and/or other ridiculously taxing activities.

Maybe I was just sleep-deprived. I don’t know, but Saturday we started the weekend off with a bang. Snowshoeing. Yes, sounds peaceful, relaxing, and slow-paced… Do not be deceived. We snowshoed for nearly FOUR hours. I thought I was going to faint. My fatal mistake was wearing those damned snowboarding boots to showshoe. They were fucking heavy as hell and the tongue dug into my shin the whole damn time. Oh man, I was exhausted. Sure, the view was awesome once we got to the ridge that is Angorra Falls. Lake Tahoe was to the right; Fallen Leaf Lake was to the left. It was a beautiful clear and sunny day. But 2 hours would have sufficed. Seriously. I’m not training to be Rocky or anything.

So fine. About 4 hours, we made it back to the house. Thank goodness there was a giant hot tub to ease away the aches and pains. Of course, I wanted to just chill in the tub, but no, there was no rest for the weary. Way too much social interaction going on in what I usually consider my sanctuary. Haha, I told you I’m an antisoc at heart. Anyway, I went to bed pretty early that night. A bunch of people showed up at the house later. John said it felt like a house party. Definitely way too many degrees of separation for me. So yeah, I retreated to the bedroom; unfortunately, I didn’t get much sleep.

The next day, we hit Sierra-at-Tahoe. I immediately put my skate helmet to good use: a couple belly flops (holy shit that hurt!), head hits, ass falls. On my way down Corkscrew Trail, a snowboarder chick plowed into me and PUSHED ME DOWN to preserve her own ass. Beotch! I felt like I was in a roller derby or something. But for my second time snowboarding, I guess I did ok. Meanwhile, John had a very relaxing day snowshoeing around Lake Tahoe.

On Monday, I was back on the slopes again– a true glutton for punishment. First trip down the bunny slope, I caught the front lip and belly flopped. It was a really bad crash. Face down, I felt my body give that guttural “ugh.” Sweet Dave, he was right there asking if I was ok. He fixed my sunglasses– the metal nosepads had basically warped flat from smashing into my face. The snowmobile medic even came by to ask if I needed medical attention. I thought to myself: this must be what it’s like to be body slammed in UFC. Seriously, after two days snowboarding, my body was the most beat up it had ever been, with bruised knees, butt, ribs. Ridiculous hurtlocker. But all in the name of good fun, right?

Nah really, I’m not yet convinced about these snow sports. They still seem like way too much effort considering the driving distance, the crazy amounts of gear, the expense… the good news is that John gave skiing another try. He took a lesson and again, his feet were KILLING him to the point of going numb. But I had him exchange his boots for a bigger size, and miraculously, that solved the problem. After that, he was riding the lift, going down the bunny slopes without any falls. He’s so cute. So maybe next year, we’ll hit the slopes again. I might even go back to skiing… snowboarding might just be too cool for me.

John and my friends always make fun of me, because I put EVERYTHING into Google calendar. At the moment, I maintain five separate calendars: work, personal, travel, health, bubbey. Yeah, I know, you could argue that five is a bit excessive and really travel and health could merge in with personal, but there are benefits to having separate cals (I’ll spare you the details). The key thing here is that the current system works awesome for me. Yes, I insert my friends’ schedules in there too. They’re reluctant to share their Google calendars with me (I don’t see why), but I input whatever deets I have regarding their vacations, schedules, moving dates, travel dates, etc. In that sense, Google calendar is like a contact management program. It allows me to remember details about my friends that I would otherwise forget. Keeps me up to speed.

And another great advantage? Chronology for blogging. If I go long periods without posting, all I have to do is refer to my calendar. In a matter of minutes, I’ll remember what the hell I’ve been up to for the past two months.

February, for example, was pretty busy. Mom-in-law’s bday, dad’s bday (I actually found Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers translated into Chinese!!), Chinese New Year/Valentine’s Day/Prez Day, badminton obsession, dog-friendly work policy, etc. And oh yes, I got my hair chopped. It was a last-minute impulsive change that I have regretted ever since. Ugh.

I also snowboarded for the first time ever. My work friends and I took Bay Area Ski Bus and did a day trip. Not too shabby but man, that ride home took FOREVER. Reminded me of being on that never-ending 21-hour bus ride from Shanghai to Beijing years ago. Anyway, here are some snow pics and even a video for your entertainment.

Yo, yo… I know, it’s been AGES again since I last wrote. Sorry for the silence. My excuse is this whole Blogger migration debacle. Over the last two months, every time I logged in to write a post, I received his alert saying Blogger was no longer supporting FTP, blah, blah. I tried to read the documentation, but long story short, it was a huge headache. So, I procrastinated. All the technical bullshit just put me out of the mood every single time.

Yesterday I finally just decided to do the migration tool thingy and what the fuck ever, I couldn’t figure out the CNAME crap so I just did the default hosting on blogspot. Btw, who the fuck took goodbers.blogspot.com? Now my blogspot URL is goodberz. Ugh. Annoying but whatever, I just set up my subdomain redirect, so hopefully for you the reader, everything is back to normal and you can still find me at www.blogger.goodbers.com. Yeah, a long and drawn-out explanation and really, I’m talking out my ass. The bottom line? I’m back, and you should be thankful. 🙂

Goddamn, we’re at the end of Q1 already. Fucking A. Work is crazy busy as this is the end of our fiscal year. Other than that, the monster news here is that Bubs started his new job last week. This means we’re back in the black. Yeah, I’m coming clean. Here in the SF Bay area where cost of living is frickin’ high, I wasn’t able to fully hack it as breadwinner. My paltry income still required us to dip into the red. Luckily we’re quite the savers, so we sustained fine during the last ten months. But now, we’re back to DINK status.

Honestly, I liked being the breadwinner. I’ll miss it for sure. John was so clearly happier having time to decompress and play. And he really was such an awesome homemaker– I got fresh, packed lunches. He baked, he gardened. He pretty much did everything except for clean, so yeah, life was pretty good. Last week I had all kinds of anxiety thinking about him returning to work. His new place is a startup again, and he’s person #4. Add to that, an hour-long commute four days a week, and well, it has the potential to be disastrous. I never said I was an optimist.

But to his credit, week one went well. He still cooked dinner, went grocery shopping, and on Saturday, he actually cleaned up around the house. So maybe this really is the new Bubs– uber proactive. And certainly, I’ll benefit from being back in the black. I went shopping yesterday; I’m going to the theater next week; I can’t wait to start traveling again. So the point here is that we’ll proceed with caution. What else can I say: we’re rejoining the ranks of mainstream America, with both partners working outside the home.

This blog is now located at http://www.goodbers.com.
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