My Black Friday

It was a weird day. 
Macy's put me into the 4am-2pm schedule and I even stayed two hours longer voluntarily, but wasn't feeling tired or anything coming back home and even after. 
Having to wake up, wait until the deadly hot water hit my body in the bathtub and wear the black clothes in the early dawn felt so revived and prepared. 
As my car rolled into the parking lot of Macy's, I was having this image of cars in the lot dotted here and there, but it wasn't. At least twenty rows or more were filled with cars in just one parking space. 


Around 5,6 am was the peak time of my excuse-me yawning due to the no customer traffic. 
Then, about 7:30ish, it started to pick up the pace and later, there was a dragon tail looking line of people on pretty every register.
The customers came up the register with items to buy and red coupons or even their own made-up cozy coupon boxes or whatnot, to debate and to use. 
Before I keep going on, I will give you the basic Macy's policy or role in terms of using coupons.


1. The coupon excludes every day value, items' price that ends up with 98 cents. 
2. The coupon can be used once per transaction. 
3. It's always either-or. You never get coupon and extra ..% off on top of that. 


But I understand. The coupon policy is kind of confusing to get, unless you are an employee there. 
The way an explanation worded on coupon is additional recipe for policy's unclearness and vagueness.


Anyway, on Black Friday, I know that everyone was so excited to use up those coupons, but unfortunately, pretty much none of the coupons were applied on items, because of the morning specials. 
So a lot of customers left the register as disappointed or angry. 
Among them wanted to talk to one of the managers and they did. 
But I don't understand. No matter how clear I thought I explained those policies to customers, they always want to talk to the manager, whose explanation is nothing really different from mine. Why can't they just trust me?


I saw some types of customers when they tried to use coupons. 
1. Trying to use the 10 dollar coupon on the item price of 6.99. 
2. Not being able to make up their minds and ordering associates to do this #1, this #2, this #3, that #4 on and on, to have items in the very, very, very possible lowest price they can try. 
-For these types of customers yesterday, I specifically asked them to make up their minds since there are people behind them. 
3. Read the coupon from word to word and try to convince me that the discount on coupon and charge should combined and later, ask me to call the manager. 


This black fri. 
I stayed awake 17 and half hours. 

Christmas Song

The retail stores never stop playing Christmas songs, so as Macy's. And it's not even Thanksgiving.

The Deer

After the rigorous day, I drove back to my home.
By the way, there are two entryways to get into the parking lot, where the tens of residents' cars are there.
As my car neared one of those ways, my slanted eyes behind the glasses flashed toward the deer, standing so tall under the streetlight and contrariwise, the deer stared back, looking pathetic. My car slowed down to stop.


A chill started to run down my spine at the thought of a deer's roots or feet hitting the windscreen, and if so, I'd imagined the earthquake outbreak on the surface of glass might affect the person sitting behind the wheel.
The seconds passed like days.


The deer and I both became still for a moment, helplessly tried to read each others' faces. As I looked into it, its elegantly elongated neck and dreamy black embedded eyes became more appealing to me. Above us, the sky was dark grayish blue.


Shortly after, I geared a stick to reverse and the car moved very slowly.
The deer, as if it had a common sense and was yielding a traffic, crossed the parking lot like a speed of light to be disappeared from my sight.

Sick

I was soooooo sick yesterday and my symptom was
-I felt like I was seeing the yellow sky, which was totally delusional.

It might have caused by one of the belows.

1. Drinking two small cups of milk two days after the expiration date

2. Irregular eating habits (Sometimes I eat a lot, sometimes I skipped the meal)

3. Cheese oven spaghetti w/ bacon and mushroom

TRY

"Try this broccoli. Try it! Will you just try it at least?"
said my grandma as she pressing the broccoli hung from her chopstick really hard against my lips.
In spite of that hard press, my mouth was refusing to be opened to an end; it was like a gatekeeper of the castle, protecting itself safely from an invading army.

Growing up, I heard that word [try] so many times from my grandma that even the distant echo is still ringing in my ears, her sexy English accent. That has led me to assume perhaps, try is her favorite English word to ever use, since she and I had developed an interesting game called, hide-and-seek, back in my childhood.
Our roles were parted, she played a hunter, I the runner; whenever she reaching out her chopstick with not-so-delicious-looking food for my mouth while saying try, that signaled me enough to run away from her immediately.

Why did I run away?
Because.. I had wanted to eat what I was familiar with only and that gave me the sense of comfort, so I didn't feel like the necessity of trying different food. I was completely content with few options of what I had, and that was used to be the tender beef.

It took me several years to summon up my courage to try broccoli. Now? Whenever I go to restaurants, I choose broccoli over all other side dishes, even over french fries, which at one point, was regarded as one of my food-idols. I enjoy broccoli regardless of how it is cooked.

I am thinking that other than a broccoli, there are so many things to try in my life and in this world.

Trying things beyond the boundary I had set it up, had always given me fears.. The fear of unknown, uncertainty in result, future and in discovering an undiscovered world, which I didn't know whether that would be harmful or not. Most of all, the fear of what my reaction would be, if things don't work out or if get rejected. I knew I'd be feeling all kinds of negative emotions.

'If I didn't try it, I wouldn't have gone through these bad, shameful emotions. What If  I try it again and feel the same bad way?' I used to think.
The basic definition I had come up with for try was a nothing, but a fear.

People always say that it doesn't hurt to try or ask. No! It definitely hurts!! When a person tried really hard for exams, jobs, businesses, sports or any sorts of applying, etc., and you can't have the desired output, it's obviously frustrating! 

Whenever I received rejections, I felt like someone is stamping a huge capitalized 'R' onto my forehead, like saying there-you-go, which I never deserved to have.
To me, these end-of-the-world kind of fears made me to step back or even stopped me from attempting.

However.. Lately, I've been starting to realize that it was NEVER-end-of-the-world when that happened unless I completely gave in. Plus, the more I experience rejections, the better I manage my worst feelings.


While deserving not to be failed after my attempts, I formulated a very simple manual that I may be working on, and that was - the more times I try, the probability of me getting failed is increasing and the vice versa. It made sense to me, because those either-or probability is out of or depended on how many times you attempt it, so it was very obvious how trying worked like that.
Therefore, I realized that trying is nothing to be shamed of or an abnormal phenomenon, but it's just a natural, how-it-is kind of thing.

Well, trying is like everything that life has to offer [or I should say, trying is what you have to chase] , because there are always good and bad sides of life and trying brought me the mix of feelings, like fun, exciting, fears, confidence and even more.
When I tried broccoli for the first time, I didn't have to like broccoli, I could either like or hate broccoli, but until I opened the door of my mouth and let the broccoli come in, I'd never know what the broccoli taste like. Luckily, broccoli worked out for my taste. 

With attempts, a lot of things.. won't work out like broccoli. I might not like it. Things won't work out for me. etc. etc. 
Trying... is like.. life.

You don't know what or how it's going to turn out until you try it.
Of course, there could be regrets after trying, but at least, there will be no regret for not trying, that for sure. Trying can be hard, but that much, trying itself is accredited and worth it.

Now I know.. Try is the best and beautiful word and present my grandma has ever given to me. 

The Lovely Bones

One day, Susie Salmon was being raped and murdered by Mr. Harvey, her neighbor that lived alone and had a hidden history of killing bunch of girls and women, when she visited his house. 

The first chapter contained that brutal murder scene and the following chapters displayed Susie being watching her family going through struggles from above the heaven, which I acknowledged the book was a novel, but at the same time, a fantasy. 

Every time when Mr. Harvey was pointed out as suspect of this case, he was able to escape the police dragnet by showing his nicely wrapped civic awareness and the participation to the investigation and conclusively and apparently, no evidence existed. However, Susie's dad was always convinced that Mr. Harvey was the culprit. 

The story seemed very genuine and pure in a way in which the story developed from Susie's voice and her point of view, but at some point, there were parts where made me to wonder like, 'is this a really 13 years-old girl's language?', because the way it composed seemed so mature and thoughtful that I would never think that this was spoken by 13 years-old girl, unless the girl itself is really.. mature in a way she thinks.. 

After being placed in the heaven, Susie has always missed her missing life in earth, such as her high school - college years, and her teenage and first love that she had with when she was alive. His name was Ray, who was an Indian teenage boy that robbed her lips. 

That one-more-kiss.. was what she was ever longing for.

It was very, very interesting to see how desperate the teenage love can be. 


Susie's mom had an affair with Detective Len Fernamen, who was in charge of investigating Susie Salmon's murder case. She was very worn out from the lost of her daughter and that's how and why that happened.

What about Mr. Harvey? 

Unfairly, he kept remained unpunished and not arrested.. and then he died from an accident.

The Salmon couple, once divorced, finally reunited.. 
Before Susie was finally taken to heaven, she made love with Ray. According to the book, she showed up to him while being dead, but how come? I honestly don't know how, but that's what happened. 

The author, Alice Sebold's composition was very rich and refined and insightful, so I really enjoyed her writing style. 

But the whole time reading this book, I can't deny the fact that I felt like there was something on my throat, because of the nature of subject's heaviness, like murder.. rape... investigation... , even though Susie and her family.. taking a road to find the truth.. and that truth, is always the love..., was really inspirational.. It was still hard topic, to swallow. 

I really wish to watch The Lovely Bones in a movie. That would be great. 

One Way

Life is..
Nothing to go back. 

The fierceness in the food competition programs

"Why are you always watching cooking shows? You should stop watching those and better be watching dramas or movies instead. Those'd be more helpful to you. Practice listening!" My mom asked and scolded me, who was sink in the sofa, at the same time. Although I knew what she was referring to, listening to English, I still liked practice listening on cooking shows.


Listening to that sizzling oil in the skillet, listening to that spatula flipping the battered fish or chicken in the sea of oil and seeing the other side turning as crispy golden brown, which is one of the common phrases hosts like to be claiming. The finishing touch'd always be the kiss of lemon.. to show  the audience 'that' Ta-da! moment and to notify them the cooking is officially done and meal is just about to be served. Or even hosts going  their knives through the bun to cut into halves, so that the skin of meat patty now facing the camera, juicy liquid bleeding from every pore tucked in the meat, was starting to tempt me. 
Cooking shows were like that to me. Those types of listening and seeing were strangely comforting me.
 They planted the fantasy of not only food but its pretty visual side on me.


Back in 2008, I was so into Project Runway (It was fashion designers' competition, in case if you didn't know) in Bravo channel, which shows the fierceness in fashion.
Right after, Top Chef in the same channel caught my eyes.
In my opinion, Top Chef differentiated itself from any other cooking shows existed at that time, because cooking shows, like where Ina Garten or Giada de Laurentis were in, showed people HOW TO cook, but Top Chef. showed us how ordinary contestants crave and fight for the title of Top Chef.

Later I found out that the format of Top Chef was very similar to that of Project Runway.
Even the contestants' arms across the chest while a cheerful opening music played were overlapping images I could find on both of shows. 


There were always less than 20 contestants and were 4 judges including the host.
Now, here's the thing. Everyone knows that 4 is even number. If the judges vote, there'd be no crossroad upon their decision making challenges, therefore, the difficulty might fall, deciding who should be the winner.
Yes, there's a host included there, but still, I think the bravo treats and allows host to be exercising the right of choice, like what other official judges do.


So among those four judges on each show, one is always the host, usually slender and good looking female model, and coincidently they both weren't born in the U.S. The other one is the expert in that field, like an acclaimed chef or famous fashion designer. The third person is always the journalist, the one who has to say things, normally critics or magazine editors. The last one is always the guest and this changes by each episode.




***Top Chef - Padma Lakshmi(model, borned in India), Tom Colicchio (chef), Gail Simmons (food critic/food and wine magazine editor), Guest


***Project Runway -  Heidi Klum (model, borned in Germany), Michael Kors (designer), Nina Garcia (fashion critic/director at elle and marie claire magazine), Guest




As you can see, the two shows were laying on different spheres, but were designed in similar formats.
And the emergence of so many similar but different programs after Top Chef were like a proof of its success.

The next food competition program.. I'd like to talk about is Chopped.
Literally, I thought Chopped was the exact clone of the Top Chef.
But as a matter of fact, the more I watched, I started to realize it wasn't.
First of all, Chopped run by episode whereas Top Chef run by season.
And the most distinguishable thing is Chopped's mystery ingredient basket. Chopped is keep brainwashing the viewers by saying that the basket may look like a picnic basket, but in fact, it's a mystery ingredient basket. But seriously, the visual is not even close to any of picnic baskets. It's the ugliest basket I've even seen. So as soon as the mystery ingredients were revealed, the contestants can rest their imaginations on a kitchen, in time limit. Some Chefs' creativeness is exceptional.. Some chefs' creativeness seemed like they shouldn't even deserve to come out in a competition.


Same mystery ingredients and same amount of time were given in Chopped.
Top Chef, however, didn't. The given conditions in Top Chef could vary among one another. The ingredients, which they're cooking, were different depends on which knives they draw in. Also, some of challenges.. they have to work in teams.. So if contestants were paired with wrong people, umm.... you don't have much options other than having readiness of mind to pack your knives and go home.


And there are even 3 judges in Chopped, the odd number.
Well, there's still the host, Ted Allen, but he totally acts as middleman and never intervene the judges' decisions, even though he himself has a lot of knowledge in food.


I liked Chopped.. Now, more than Top Chef.

Chopped gave a birth few days ago, and the child was Food Network's new series, Sweet Genius.
My grandma and I were sitting side by side and just watched it.
At certain point, my grandma started to slap my lap, like her instrument, or.. the sign of emergency.
"Ouch!" I looked at grandma once and then look at the TV and her slapping made sense to me.


The contestants mounted the stairs and finally arrived in front of the host of Sweet Genius, Ron Ben-Israel, and they all placed their food in front of Ron Ben-Israel.


I was struck by this scene. I can't still forget the feeling I got from that scene.
It was like people devoting food to the temple of the Greek Gods or something.


Ron Ben-Israel.. I don't know who is he.. and it was my first time seeing him on Sweet Genius, but I knew that Food Network placing him as host AND judge (one and only judge) was a huge mistake. There was no other judges other than him.


He.. was in charge of everything, literally. Everything he was responsible for, everything he could be blamed for the result. One judge in competition program like this. I mean, I still can't get it.
Three or other odd number of judges would be ideal. to discuss and to make a decision.
But one???


Well, people, including me, may perceive Ron Ben-Israel as Goddess of pastry or something.
His authority as judge.. is way too powerful. It's like giving all authority to this one man.
One man.. is going to decide the winner of each episode and to deliver his criticisms.
But.. aren't people, in general, have different opinions?


Trusting his intuition only was too risky.. Too risky and I don't even want to watch it.