candlelight

it's been a long time since i've fallen asleep to candlelight, but thanks to the crazy weather we've been having, that's what i did last night. our power cut out at close to 1am, and it was PITCH black in our house. jenie and i couldn't even see each other when we were literally inches away from each other. alinna & hideyo's unity candle that we somehow ended up with has purpose after all! did you guys see the news about the crane that fell over from the wind and crashed through the ceiling of vallco and created this huge hole? good thing vallco is pretty much a dead mall b/c it happened during normal mall hours.

awesome!! my email thread with drew.

From: Drew Hyun [mailto:xxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 10:23 AM
To: Karen Chiu
Subject: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Happy birthday Karen!!!

Drew =)
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From: Karen Chiu [mailto:xxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 1:28 PM
To: 'Drew Hyun'
Subject: RE: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

HAHAHAHAHA. uh when's my birthday, drew?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Drew Hyun [mailto:xxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 11:45 AM
To: 'Karen Chiu'
Subject: RE: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Mmm, today?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Karen Chiu [mailto:xxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 2:52 PM
To: 'Drew Hyun'
Subject: RE: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

HAHAHAHAHA. thanks for the effort, though. try again :)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Drew Hyun [mailto:xxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 12:06 PM
To: 'Karen Chiu'
Subject: RE: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Doh!

When is it??!


i think he was really proud of himself for remembering. uh. except he remembered the wrong day. he didn't even get the right month!! ahhhhhhhahahahaha. but i'm touched that he tried. that definitely was the highlight of my day.

i try to park as close to my work building as possible since non-visitor parking is not super close to my buildling, and i'm not really able to walk without pain yet (and i don't have a handicap parking permit). so the other day i was trying to find a spot along one row which looked pretty much full. until i found only two spots. one on either side of this puppy.



our CEO bought another ferrari. i'm surprised he doesn't park in the garage, even if it's further from our building. this, after buying a black version of this sucker less than a year ago.



well, i guess our stock price isn't exactly hurting him.

and if you're wondering, yes, i did park next to him. i value my knee over his car. heck, my knee cost the same as his "measly" third car.

lost keys?

uhhh... do these keys belong to anyone? or do you know anyone who lost their keys who's been to our place? jenie found these wedged way in the back of our couch, and we have no clue when they were lost here. could have been a year ago, for all we know. first person who brings a car to our house that the keys fit into get to take the keys home :) i assume it should at least be an acura. :)



man, it's going to be a crazy week. new forecast cycle at work, so lots of late nights, but on top of that i have a bunch of stuff i need to do for jen/jer's wedding, as well as go to my regular PT sessions, which means i usually get home after 9pm. at least it's a four-day week for me since i'm taking friday off, even if it means i have to find time to work over the weekend.

tried to go to nola's with some of the non-ski people (basically bread of life canaan people + karen, for some odd reason) on saturday, only to find out there was a 1.5 hour wait. so we ate at palo alto creamery fountain & grill instead. watched crash afterwards at byria's - fairly intsense movie, we were joking that we'd say the one thing we learned from the movie was to not wear socks on hardwood stairs. since we didn't make it to nola's on saturday, we made reservations for sunday where i finally got to taste the food. good stuff, the etouffee is definitely worth it.



i have a very expensive right knee. i know charges to health insurance are super inflated, but total charges to my insurance from the past year add up to over $90k. of the $90k, a whole $150 is not related to my knee. and that doesn't include the last couple of dr visits, pt visits, or my dr charges for the third surgery. i should cast my knee in gold or something. other than that, i'm in a lot of pain. there are large lumps in my knee, larger than what i went into the surgery with. i know i've said this over and over again, but I have to constantly remind myself that God is in charge. God has a purpose. otherwise, i will break down into tears.

i don't like to put song lyrics on my blog because i think it's super cheesy and i never read them when other people put them on their blogs, but i'm going to do it. more for myself than for any other reason, because Rich Mullins really put how i'm feeling right now well. and though he wrote it when he was dealing with temptation in Amsterdam, i think it still really applies to my life & situation right now. Only going to put the first verse to spare everyone. :)

Hold Me Jesus
Well, sometimes my life just don't make sense at all
When the mountains look so big
And my faith just seems so small

So hold me Jesus, 'cause I'm shaking like a leaf
You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace

quick ramblings

1.

wow, i wouldn't even be able to do this on the piano! quite impressive. link courtesy of bob.

2. yay for friends who work for cool companies! thanks to amy once again, we get to help volunteer for the third day/david crowder concert at the flint center, and gain free admission. woohoo! i've never been able to help volunteer at spirit west coast since it's always in july during quarter-end at work, so when concerts pop up, i always jump on the opportunity. and it's in my own backyard this time. if you want to volunteer or know anyone who may be interested, let me know!

3. Anyone have $1400 to spare and want a 30" Dell flat-panel monitor? Guess they're giving employees of my company an $800 discount to this monitor. Pretty decent discount, but still $$. but wanted to throw it out there if anyone was shopping for one.

4. I had to train some coworkers yesterday and today on a system I've been involved in help designing for our company. Seriously - if you're getting trained, don't irritate the trainer. For example, don't NOT pay attention and work on your laptop the entire time, and then when it comes time to use the system, make me sit by you and teach you step-by-step again what to do. Or don't interrupt me in the middle of my training to try to train ME incorrectly on the very system i'm trying to train YOU on. sounds ridiculous, right? but it happened! drive me crazy. okay. done with rant.

5. my pt told me that one of her patients works for HR at my company. my pt told me she told her about me and my surgeries and how i (as well as several other patients of hers who work at my company) have been screwed by our health insurance. that person knows the person who is involved in negotiating our health insurance contract and said she would definitely talk to the person about our therapy coverage and why it sucks so bad and try to get it improved. my pt didn't tell the person my name, but the HR person told her, hey i think i know who you're talking about, i see her hobbling around everywhere (i work in the same buildling as HR). great. it may be too late to benefit me, but maybe by next year we'll have a better policy.

6. my mom is taking me for my birthday (yes, very early) on sunday after church to a ballet. even though i used to do ballet, i've never really watched many and... i actually think sometimes they're boring. gasp. hahaha. but this one sounds interesting. it's right down the street from church, too - on castro - i didn't even know there's a theater on castro?

7. my coworker downloaded the 24 ringtone (not the 24 song, but the actual office phone ring they use on the show) on his cell phone. now every time i hear it ring, my ears perk up and i think jack bauer is calling chloe or is somewhere around.

8. NBC needs to learn how schedule their programs better. why did they put the highlight of the entire olympics, womens figure skating, on at 11pm?? ridiculous. both jenie and i fell asleep in front of the tv and missed the entire thing. what we managed to stay awake for was downhill skiing. yay. no wonder NBC's ratings for the olympics have sucked.

boys will be boys

some people came over tonight to hang out with eva while she was in town. somehow, our discussion evolved to the girls asking chris & bob how much they knew about fashion, makeup - basically anything female-oriented. it was quite entertaining. some highlights:

question: what is gingham?
bob:...a spice?

question: what are layers in hair?
bob: uh... something expensive. because when i ask girls why they don't cut their own hair they say because they want to get their hair layered.

question: what is the difference between a skirt and a dress?
chris: err... the lengths?

question: what is a stiletto?
bob: (with confidence) a knife! (which i guess it is...)

question: what is the difference between mascara and eyeliner?
chris: mascara you put on top of your eye and eyeliner you put underneath your eye?

and... my favorite...

question: what is the difference between pantyhose and tights?
bob: guys wear tights.

hahaha. can any of you guys answer these questions correctly? thanks to chris & bob for being such good sports. it was definitely amusing. i'm sure the girls would have failed just as badly on male-oriented questions.

lost and found

hallelujah!

first: finally got my stitches out! it hurt like none other because my scars scabbed over my stitches. my conversation with the doctor (again, not my actual doctor but some other one) basically went like this:

doctor: well it's only been a week...
me (interrupting): no it's been two weeks
doctor: two weeks?? why'd you wait so long to get your stitches out?
me: because i couldn't get an appointment!
doctor: you should have told me, i would have just double-booked you.
me: i asked to schedule it earlier, but the person said it's better to wait longer. i didn't want to, but they wouldn't schedule me earlier.
doctor: i don't know why they said that, you should have come to me.
me: great.
(now he's trying to cut my stitches, but is having trouble because they're buried somewhere under my scabs. he's been yanking on one stitch forever, i'm just trying not to think about it, until...)
doctor: do you hate me? you should hate me right about now. (continues yanking and tugging and snipping.)
me (not exactly the words i want to hear while someone is inflicting pain on me): great, thanks.

anyway, he finally managed to get them out, so now i'm a happy camper.

second: my cell phone, which was once lost, has now been found. "Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin." err... i mean phone. :) it was at my pt clinic. my favorite voicemails were the ones from olivia. it started with her leaving a nice, normal message, then slowly progressed to the eventual last message, which only consisted of: "where are you???" click.

my pt is so excited that after one year, i can finally fully extend my knee. my knees trick people because of my hyperextension - so what supposedly looks like a straight knee to them, really isn't. so this entire past year, all my doctors have thought i've had full extension this whole time when i haven't. anyway, i think she was pretty happy that i can hold my extension now, so yesterday she leaned over to me and whispered "if i were you, i would never go back to dr. xx (my first doctor)." i was like, obviously i'd never go back to him. anyway she told me she's seen other patients of his that weren't so successful either. i was like gee, thanks for telling me now. telling me before my second surgery would have been helpful - then maybe i wouldn't have needed the third. oh well, she's probably not supposed to say that to me in the first place. and though i'm still in a lot of pain, i'm happy and thankful that i can extend my knee. i have still yet to overcome my real nemesis: the stairs. yesterday i got demoted from doing step ups and downs (because they hurt so much) to just doing 1/4 squats.

this weekend is the annual canaan ski trip. this is the first one i'm missing since i've graduated and come back home. it also marks the one year anniversary of my ... accident. have fun everyone! bummed i won't be going this year, even to just hang out in the cabin. snow + karen = big no-no. :( but at least it makes me available for what may be a two-person worship team on sunday. piano and acoustic. sometimes it's nice to go back to the basics, yeah? :)

having today off is great! went with o & jenie to stanford shopping mall. sadly, i could barely make it from one end of the mall to the other. and i mean barely. it was painful. so my reward: pizza my heart! :)

couple of things:

-watched end of the spear last night with some ppl from my small group. it's awesome to see the transformation of the waodani tribe - people who had deep-rooted traditions in revenge and killing to survive. and they overcome such deep-seeded hatred and violence as a way of life that it could have only been done through Christ. it really shows how God triumphs over all. if you guys want to watch it, you'd better go fast. it's only left playing in one theater in the entire area, and a ghetto one at that. by the way, that theater still has a drive-in. pretty cool, it'd be fun to go once for old-times sake. :)

-costco grapefruits are back. go get them before they go out of season. they are super sweet.

-i get my stitches out tomorrow. finally! no more peeling duct tape off my skin after showers.

-my knee, well. i have my ups and downs. it's hard not getting frustrated over it - even though my mind tells my heart "trust in God. trust in His plan." it's still hard. i'm still in a lot of pain, and a lot of what i felt before the sugery, i feel now, and maybe even worse. but there are some things that are better. and it's only been less than 2 weeks since the surgery, so i still have to give it time. but now i'm worried about running out of pt sessions again.

keep praying. that's what i have to remind myself.

at the very least, i can play piano, so jen & jerry, no need to worry about your wedding. what you should maybe worry about is what we're going to do during your reception. ;) just kidding. we'll try to be good.

augh, i may have lost my cell phone. my last hope is that i left it at pt - otherwise it was taken from the locker room at club one since they said no one turned in a phone to the lost and found (my pt clinic is conjoined with club one). unfortunately, my pt clinic isn't open again until tuesday. the phone was on vibrate, so i can't call it, plus people tell me that it goes straight to voicemail now, so it must have run out of battery or something. i went everywhere yesterday to look for it - i feel so disconnected since i cannot call anyone (don't have anyone's phone #) and no one can reach me (no one calls our landline - in fact, we never pick it up. in double fact, i don't think we even have a working phone connected to our landline except for our answering machine, which doesn't have a phone connected to it since it broke when i threw up on it the day of the surgery on my left knee in college. yes, our answering machine is that old.) it's actually a little bit freeing not having it with me, but i do need my phone back. i got lots of "why is your phone off?" and "why didn't you return my calls?" this morning. plus olivia said she left a voicemail for me in a very sad voice. i gotta hear that. haha.

i cannot believe cal lost to arizona state last night. horrendous game. i stopped watching at the end because it was too painful and the slam dunk contest was on. i liked two dunks: robinson's over spud webb (hey, he's as tall as all my male friends - if he can dunk like that, why can't you guys? ;) and iguodala's dunk off the back of the backboard. he should have saved that one for the finals. i loved the comment about robinson - "if he's 5'9" then i'm skinny." hahaha. guess 5'9" is a little generous.

man, pt yesterday was tough. my therapist is making me work on quads and extensions my body has not realized has existed for the past year, and it really hurts, especially the extreme tightness inside my knee when trying to contract and hold my quads that hard. on top of that, i still feel intense pressure inside my knee when standing and walking, similar to what i felt before my surgery. i hope it's just fluid/swelling that will eventually go away.

with cal's win over arizona last night, they are now tied for first in the (weak) pac-10 with ucla and on track to make it to the tournament, and even a chance at the pac-10 title. good thing they're peaking in the second half of the season. leon powe is the man.

it's NBA all-star weekend! time to watch those dunks. :) my one consolation for not being able to attend wcc this year.

ps. maria started blogging! go check her out.

not for the queasy

since many have been asking, i uploaded one of the videos from my surgery. if you get queasy, don't watch... but i don't think it's so bad. it's actually pretty fascinating. this is the first time, out of all four of my knee surgeries, that i've seen actual video. i've seen pictures, but not video.




my hot date at physical therapy yesterday (by the way, reni. my pt is a girl!) was okay. it was like homecoming because i haven't been there since sometime in november (i went to a different branch last thurs since my pt works at both and i couldn't get an appt at my normal one). i know all the aides pretty well since i spent a good portion of my life there last year and was always the last patient there for the night, so i would chat with them a lot while they waited for me so they could close up the clinic. my therapist seemed very tentative about pushing me on bending my knee - i think she was traumatized from all the blood spillage last week. i'm at -5 degrees extension (is it negative? basically, i can hyperextend 5 degrees). yay! my pt said she's never seen my knee so straight before. i'm at about 110 degrees flexion, again, because she didn't push me hard. she kept asking me, "are you SURE your holes won't reopen??" even though i tried to assure her that i didn't think they'd bleed anymore.

i was talking to one of the patients while we were getting ice & stim - she was telling me she was wondering where i went since i kind of disappeared at the end of the year. it turns out she's had seven (!) surgeries on both her ankles (so seven on each ankle, not seven combined). she said at one point, she had a surgery every other week. her scars were huge - more than a foot long. she basically got an infection from a bacteria that's only found at the dentist or the gym. she's pretty sure she got it from the gym since she used to go a lot, and must have used one of the machines that still had sweat on it, and it infused into her skin, through her body and down to her ankles. or something like that. how horrible. all you people who work out, be careful! God definitely used her to yet again put perspective in my life. wow. who am i to complain about my situation.

my hot date

my title got your attention? :)

i'm forever going to be known at my company as the girl with the knee problems. you'd think that at a company with 2500+ people, you could get by somewhat invisibly, but that is hardly the case. whether it's in the parking lot, the receptionists, people on my floor, in the bathroom, random people in the cafeteria, or even my CEO, all have noticed that i am, yet again, limping around with knee issues.

so guess what today is. that's right, one of my brother's birthday. :) and i have a hot date tonight at the physical therapy clinic. let the fun times begin.

starting anew

okay, i archived my old blog, solely for the purpose of getting rid of my two-commenting system. (wanted to migrate to blogger comments but not lose all my old comments on old posts).

got terribly confused in the process, but i think hopefully everything is okay now.

click here for my old posts!