Two Classes?!

Oh my Buddha! Am I going to teach two classes for next term?! I have ambivalent feelings right now. I feel relieved because my income has been secured, though compensation is dirt-cheap. On the other hand, I feel overwhelmed and stressed out already, thinking of a lot of work to prepare for those classes.

Both classes are totally new to me (actually, I proposed a new class, and they like my idea, geez). And the size of one class is max 147?! They must be losing their mind. Do they think that I can teach that gigantic class? Man, I'm in trouble.

Problem Solved?

I was pissed off, well, I've been pissed off by the housing office since when I was charged $40 for nothing.

Anyway, this morning, I realized that I hadn't got a response from the person in charge. So, I got the license to be pissed off. I called the housing office by saying this person in charge was ignoring my emails and phone calls, and therefore I needed to talk with her supervisor. But her supervisor was not available. The operator put me through her supervisor's voice mail. Voice mail again! I hate voice mail. But I had no choice but to leave my message, "I moved out the property at the end of June and returned all keys to the community center. But the housing office charged me $40 for keys that I returned. JC (the person in charge) is ignoring my emails and phone calls. I request full refund. You, call me back for more details."

After my angry phone call, the situation progressed fast. While I was doing exercise at the Y, I got an email from the person in charge by saying that $40 would be returned in a couple of weeks.

Well, that's good news. I assume her supervisor talked with her. And probably the person in charge said to her supervisor, "Oh, I've been so busy to respond to her. Should I refund $40?" Obviously, this person didn't do any investigation on where my keys were. She's such a dumb-ass. Probably, her supervisor said, "It's just $40. Refund it."

I'm still pissed off. The person in charge and the housing office didn't apologize me. Well, if I don't get refund in a couple of weeks, I will be granted the license to be pissed off more.

Disrespectful Person in Charge

So, I sent a detailed email to the housing office person in charge about my returned keys last Friday. Today is Monday, school is open. She didn't reply! F**king chicken!

I thought it's ridiculous to keep contacting her, a useless person. But I emailed her for the last time, telling her that if she can't handle this situation, I will talk to her supervisor.

Well, once again, I will see how she will react to this.

Reply

OK, the housing office person in charge replied. But her reaction is not satisfactory. She said she would track down what happened when I moved out. Well, go for it and refund my money!

I emailed her details of what it was like when I returned keys and asked her for a TIMELY investigation and refund. Again, let's see how she will respond to it.

Ignored

Well, my message was ignored by the housing office person in charge. She hasn't responded to me, which pisses me off. I even called her today a couple of times, but my calls were transferred to her voice mail, which pissed me off.

So, I emailed her. And I will see how she will react to it.

Groundless Charge

What?! The housing office charged me $40 for lost keys. What's the hell?! I returned all keys on June 29 when I moved out!

I called the housing office, but the person in charge was off duty today. The operator transferred me to her voice mail. I left my angry but mature message, so I will see how she will respond to me.

McMenamins, Two Evenings in a Row

Yesterday, I went to North Bank with GM, and I went to another McMenamins pub with KL. Again, we started drinking at 4. Funny.

On the way home, KL took me her place and made udon for me. She even took dashi (soup stock) from bonito flakes to make udon soup, oh my Buddha! Her udon tasted very Kansai, delicate. It was yummy.

North Bank

GM and I went to North Bank to have beer from 4 pm! Wow, what a luxury. It was pretty nice out there, sitting outside along the river to have beer and chat.

The best thing is that I don't have to worry about mosquito bites. If it's in Japan, man, I can't stay outside, drinking beer. I am so attractive to mosquitoes, and I'd get hundreds of mosquito bites in ten minutes, being outside, especially consuming alcohol that raises my body temperature, which further attracts mosquitoes.

I told GM that I'd miss this moment (again!), and he said, "Remember this moment." Yeah, I will.

I told GM about my "interesting" relationship with DS. From my story, GM thinks DS is a super-shy person. Mm, I doubt it. I gave him opportunities twice that he could easily take advantage of if he wanted, but he didn't use them. So, what does this mean? Well, I'm still confused.

Anyhow, it's always nice to have GM as a company. How many more times can I have beer with him?! ... Ahhhh, I'm emotional again!

Will Miss This Moment

This is nothing special and in fact an everything thing.

I went to see my adviser this morning for his feedback on my dissertation. Well, I needed his help to decode his handwriting, to tell you the truth. Anyway, our meeting ended up having a chatty chat, talking about things other than my dissertation. I like it. And I love this comfortable relationship with my adviser. I really think that I made a good decision to switch advisers a couple of years ago. Wow, it's already two years. Sorry, JR, I have given you a hard time for the whole two years, hee hee hee.

And I thought, I will miss this moment, chatting small things with my adviser. Thank you, JR, for taking care of me.

After I chatted with my adviser, I went to the IT guys office to ask them to set up connections to the printer. After my school moved to a new building, I lost connections to printers, which is really inconvenient. So, I went there. A familiar guy was sitting at the front desk. I asked him to set up connections to the printer. You know, IT guys are kind of dorky-dorky, but I love these nerdy guys in my school. And this guy is a sweet person. He couldn't figure it out mainly because my PC is Japanese, and he called A, his boss, who is also a familiar, sweet guy. Chatting with these laid-back guys, with sunshine coming in from the windows, I felt, ahhh, I'll miss this moment, seriously.

After that, I went to the library to concentrate on revisions of my dissertation. Before I got a table, I dropped by AS's office to say hi. He was there. He is a young, yo-yo kind of dude but sweet person. And handsome. I like him very much, like my young brother. We reported each other's situation and chatted stupid things. And again, I felt, oh my Buddha or whatever, I will definitely miss this moment. I don't know, but every moment is really precious to me.

I've been in an emotional period for the last few days, which is not good because I'd behave weirdly. I have to hold myself together.

The First 4th of July

I never spent the Fourth of July in this country because I was either in Japan or traveling somewhere else. So, this is the first time for me to be in the United States on July 4.

I was excited to see what people would do for today. Luckily, three of my friends invited their parties. I asked them what they would do. They said, "We will have BBQ and fireworks." OK, three different parties would do BBQ and fireworks. That is, July 4 is the date of BBQ and fireworks. That's what I learned.

I have only this tiny body, so I picked up the party that invited me first. It was a nice mixture of people--Caucasians, Hawaiians, Japanese American, old and young people. The party was held in a gigantic house where only two people live. Oh man, look at my little apartment. Thinking that I'll never own that kind of huge house, I felt wealth is never equally distributed. Of course, we are living in capitalist society. How could I forget that?

Marxism aside, it was pretty fun to see a bunch of friendly people and have good food.

Fireworks

I excused myself around 9:30 and went to DS's because I promised to come over to see her kids play fireworks.

The party venue and DS's are 10 minutes apart, including a little bit of freeway ride. I got off freeway and came to the street that DS lives on. Oh man, people were playing fireworks on the street here and there. So, I had to stop until a batch of fireworks went out, drove a little bit and stopped again for fireworks. I repeated this several times until I got to DS's.

It was funny to see people were so excited about primitive fireworks. Fireworks here are not comparable to Japanese artistic fireworks. Aerial fireworks are illegal in this state, but there are a bunch of people launched them anyway. From DS's backyard, we could see them in all directions.

Sunny!

Oh, I felt so good today because it was sunny!

SA played tennis tournaments today, so I went and took a look. And AP joined me in the audience a while later. It was fun to have a chat with AP under the sun, while SA was playing in the background. Sorry, SA, I didn't pay good attention to your game. He lost the game. Oops, sorry again.

AP and I went for lunch afterward and had more chat. It was a very nice sunny Friday to spend with my friends :) Again, I will miss this moment a lot ... Oh, I feel weirdly sad now ...