Yay money!

Can I do a little money dance? And just say that I can finally think less about money for the next few months. Thank you preschool supervisors, for thinking I am worth it. :)

Truly truly appreciate it.

Pet Peeve #4

I looked back at my previous blog posts.. and realized that I have already mentioned 3 of my pet peeves.. triggered of course by situations requiring me to 'stand' those pet peeves. Adding Pet Peeve #4 to the list:

Cleaning up other people's messes. Can't stand it.

My roommate left the bathroom in a mess for me to clean up while she's gone over the weekend. Water all over the floor by the bathtub, soaked with a towel just left on the floor haphazardly. Soaking wet bathrug just hanging half into the bathtub, half on the floor. Plastic drawer set moved to block the toilet bowl. And all the cleaning supplies moved to block the sink. Oh, and that's not all... Damp clothing, in the middle of the floor of the bathroom! With dirty socks and underwear within the pile. UGH!

I DO NOT like cleaning other people's messes. Especially if I am put in the situation where I am forced to clean up the mess. It's not like I can maneuver around the drawers to pee.. Or use the bathtub with the wet rub just hanging like that.. Plus its super not appealing to have dirty clothing that's NOT MINE lying in the middle of the bathroom floor.

It's Annoying as hell.

1 Roommate left for winter break.. and the one talked about above will be back tomorrow. Spring cleaned the apartment today to my standards. Wiped down the kitchen counters, bought dish machine detergent to clean out the dish machine, vacuumed the floor (to my standard), and cleaned my room of crap papers and documents. All's good now. I think in the future, I would really like an apartment that is clean or dirty by my standards, and my standards only.

This Holiday Season

It's that time of the year again. The time when I usually miss my family the most. Well, the time other than Chinese New Year when I miss my family the most. Christmas...! 8 days away. Just 8 days. This Christmas, it'll be a new friend, Shao Fern, the bro and I.. and the Baldy family. :) Texted my dad to say that I'm homesick. And got a reply back saying I should be thankful, and not complain. And he decided it would be okay to make me jealous and slobbery over a new chicken rice place that he found... One of the simple things in Malaysian life... Chicken Rice. That, and Duck rice. Man, I miss the food at home. But hey, Baldy family Christmas coming right up! It'll be a good one!

The weather hasn't exactly been winter-y. Usually by now, it should already be snowing and freezing cold. But somehow, winter hasn't really seemed to arrive yet. Yeah, it's kinda snowed twice. But after that and between those two snowfalls, seems like Jack Frost is on vacation or something. Not that I'm complaining about the mild winter. I just get worried about global warming every time I step out of the house and get surprised by the lack of chill there is outside.

This semester is probably one of the best semesters of my grad school career. Now I totally understand why people use the phrase 'grad school career'. Because it really is a career. At least my program is. It's not just as simple as study study and take exams and be done. It's more like study study, clinic clinic, reports reports, research research, exams exams, final reports final reports, meetings meetings, TA work TA work... and then just when we thought we were done.. Comps Comps Comps Comps. All in all though, this semester was great because of preschool. My experience at the preschool really has created doubts in my mind of whether I want to work with adults or kids. Darn it! Or as one of my 3-year-old girls would say "Damn it!" "What the heecckkk!" :D Those kids really made me smile. They really made my Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Watching them grow and learn so much in the span of 5 months have been amazing. I learned so much at the preschool. From potty training, to language stimulating.. to time outs... to disciplining (the American way, no rotan involved)... changing the environment to get appropriate behavior, dealing with tantrums and to singing children songs, to making popcorn, peanut butter playdoh and applesauce.. I had an awesome time. Giving hugs to the two girls, and telling the parents that their kids would have another special teacher next semester was heartbreaking for me. Totally gonna miss them. A career down the kids path... maybe?

Almost.. almost...

Blogging seems to be a thing of the past for me. How sad is that? Life has had its interesting moments.. blogging material worthy too.. but, business of grad school just totally took blogging away from me.

Gaah, who am I kidding. I could have always blogged after a 7-6pm day.. that is after I'm done with either reading research articles, writing reports, planning client sessions or finishing assignments.... I'm not even gonna keep going on about grad school. Since my 4th semester is done and over with! Yes, peeps. I'm done with my 4th semester of grad school. When I first started, seemed like this time would never come. But turns out it has. That's the good thing about time. It does pass, no matter how difficult a situation you're in, it does pass. That is if you work hard, and do what you can to get past that time. Anyway, I'm not supposed to be on full-break mode though. According to grad school, winter break is supposed to be a time to complete Comp exams. 4 essays, based on 4 previously taken grad school classes. Made an assprint on my couch yesterday, trying to start one. Need I even say, that I failed? Not only did I fail to start, I failed to even choose questions that could potentially help me get a passable grade. So, of course. I had a major freakout moment on my couch. And of course, I had to go rant about it to the Facebook world.. and OF COURSE, the superwoman, over-achieving girl in my program had to comment on facebook that she finished 1 comp essay in 2 hours, and that comps wasn't as bad as she expected. Way to go to make me feel bad. And so, I decided, to spend the rest of the night singing Karaoke (the Asian way) with program friends. Nothing like a night of singing with tambourines and cheesy karaoke videos featuring butts and kissing to cure a freakout moment. Also, helped me get a flashback to my childhood, when we sang songs like "Top of the World" and "Sukiyaki". Those two songs, always reminds me of being in my dad's car. And listening to (I think they were called) the latest NOW! music tapes.. Those songs were my favorite... and I remember singing them in the car so much, to and fro from my babysitter's to tuition. Those two songs, and of course The Cranberries' Zombie and Whitney Houston's Greatest Love of All. Daddy remember those songs? They always remind me of you. Anyway, totally digressing.

Went to campus today to turn in a final paper, and OF COURSE superwoman, over-achieving girl was there. And she finished 3 of her comp essays. That means she has 1 left. Just ONE!! Gaaaahhhhhh...

Now.. Operation Prevent Freakout Moment...

This year's Thanksgiving was spent in DC with my two lovely lifelines.. Joliana and Hui. Can never thank these two girls enough, for always always always answering my texts and calls. For always always always understanding me and my actions and my moods and the flicker of facial expressions more than even I do.. and of course, for knowing my thoughts even without me telling them. Needless to say, they're my family away from home.

Cuddling. 

Walking. 

Eating. 

Sunset-ing. 

Dancing/Drinking. 

Loving. <3

Is this not the Cutest?

Sea Otters holding hands.. so they don't drift apart when sleeping.

Pet Peeves

Cannot stand people yawning out loud ALL THE TIME. Once in awhile, it's okay.. It's okay when you're really really tired. But if everytime you yawn I can hear you... It's very not okay. Instead, it's a tad annoying. 

Cannot stand picky people. No, no. Very very picky people. And the worse part, they're proud of their picky-ness. Not something to be proud of, seriously. Especially when you meet people like me who judge you for being picky. No offense. :) When I say picky.. I don't mean picky like pick-your-nose-all-the-time kind of picky. Although, that's not very appealing either. I mean picky like you can't eat a lot of different kinds of foods because you're a very "texture person" and can't stand a lot of different textures. Or you nitpick at things that really don't need any nitpicking and make others just really annoyed. Or you won't do certain things or go to certain places because you're afraid you're going to be uncomfortable.


Can you tell, the second is a heeuge pet peeve of mine. I seriously feel like staying away from picky people. Because they drive me crazy. And I know, I know, my family's gonna tell me that I'm picky too. And to a certain extent, we all are! But I am not picky like the above okay!

Random-ness

 Come back.. so we can go on trips together, and stay warm in the winter together, and drink and party together.. :D

Got my some long overdue Katie love this past weekend. :) Went for my first (and probably last) Purdue football game against OSU. No better girl to enjoy the game with other than Katie, the cursing-and-so-stressed-and-pissed OSU fan!

Coming home to my doggie is the best feeling ever. If no one else in the world loves me, at least he does!

Perks of Preschool!

One of the perks of being at the preschool....... FIELD TRIPS!

Sat on the Boilermaker Special today.. the Purdue train basically. And went to different Purdue spots that I didn't even know exist. The fountain, the animal statues, the football stadium, oh and the Purdue airport. Is it absolutely kiddish of me to have actually had a tonne of fun!? The best part? Getting a tour of the FedEx plane and being able to see the cockpit! I was just thinking to myself that that was the first time I've ever really seen a plane's cockpit! But then I remembered how a friend in undergrad kinda snuck us into Miami's airport and let us get on one of the private planes parked in the hangar. Oh, and we drove in his car, really fast on the runway with our heads sticking out of the roof and arms wide open just like Titanic (but without a guy, and in a car) haha. Twas a pretty good night. Getting on the plane today though, with a bunch of kids... was different. It wasn't scary and nerve-wrecking, instead I had to talk and describe everything to the kids (just like how we were trained, lol). Btw, did you know that the FedEx plane has seats in them? I guess FedEx ships people as well? :)

It's hard to believe that this is my 2nd and last year of grad school. I'm almost almost done! I'm actually mentoring 1st year grad students now! And it's so interesting seeing them dabbling in clinic for their first time! Reminded me of my first year, and how I was with my first client, and I still remember thinking that my 2nd year mentor was soo good at saying the right thing, the right way and at the right time. And I remember hoping to myself that that will be me by my 2nd year. I'm proud to say that I think that I've been trained well. Some things are ingrained in us by our supervisors, and it's obvious because those are the things that we pick out as difficulties that the 1st years have in clinic!

Three golden rules, that you don't really know when you first start clinic:
Rule 1: Ask fewer questions. Make more comments. It's therapy you're doing! Not an interview!
Rule 2: Pay attention to your client. Don't just think about carrying out your activity. You need to cater your activities to their responses. Flexibility is key!
Rule 3: Use simple, direct sentences. Pause often. Emphasize on key words. Don't speak in a whole jumble of sentences.

If there's nothing else that I remember from grad school, I'll at least remember the 3 golden rules. :) 

Halloween Happiness!

It's been such a long time since I've blogged. Things are just same ol' same ol' over on my end. Still having poopy and nose-snot days at the preschool. And still enjoying it as much as ever. Had to sit on the floor in the bathroom today with a little boy who was so sad that his mum left him at school and did not walk him in. I had to convince him that his mum was going to come back and pick him up just like always. I told him that the long hand on the clock is going to go around twice, and then she will be back to pick him up. Thinking about it now, I probably should have told him that the short hand on the clock will move to 10 and then to 11 and then his mum will be back! Dumb dumb me.

Yesterday was Halloween. My friends and I had our party last weekend instead. This year's Halloween came with a Voice and a Dysphagia exam. So the weekend before Halloween was spent trying to study and memorize information about types of assessments we can do for swallowing and what kinds of characteristics of the vocal folds a person with nodules will have. This semester is really a wing-it-for-the-exam kind of semester. Good thing that I've already had my clinic placement at the hospital.. makes the exam so much easier to go through. It really is true that merely studying the information will not make anything stick in your head. Learning through hands-on is what helps me remember at least. How else will I remember that palpation is when you put your fingers on a patient's neck to feel his swallow and his laryngeal elevation. And that cervical auscultation is when you listen to a patient's airway before, during and after the swallow using a stethoscope. :) During the exam, I could just hear my clinic supervisor saying those things in my head. Haha.

Anyway, back to Halloween. This year's Halloween party really reminded me of the past Halloweens that I had back in Miami. Going over to each others' houses to get ready for Halloween, having people who would actually help me think of do-able cheap costumes for me, taking hilarious pictures with each other while trying to stay "in character" and taking shots with each other... I really miss all that with my Miami family. But you know what I'm proud of.. that I did do all that this year with new friends. I went over to a friend's house to get ready. I didn't think of a costume for myself like usual, and another friend was thinking of costume ideas for me and said "Suling! You should be a present! Wrap yourself up in wrapping paper!" That's how the 'present' idea was born. I was at a Halloween party this year! and I had a lot of fun too.. I gave out shots and took shots with others... and took hilarious pictures too! Things are difficult at times, but I do know that if I persist to be unhappy about things, I will just be making my life unhappy for me. And I don't want that. I want to be independent, have people around me that I can call friends and be content. It took some time to get used to life without friends around me all the time. But I think I'm getting pretty good at it :) Maybe the next step is to live in a single apartment? With my doggie. Yes. My doggie!

 And look who else was forced to dress up for 6 whole hours for kids at work... A very unhappy-attempting-to-be-scary clown!

Happy Halloween everyone! :)

Knowing what I'm doing...

I love the feeling of knowing what I'm doing. Or at least, being comfortable with only just sort of knowing but still not worried about doing it wrongly.

Having a first year grad student helper at the preschool to assist me with my hyperactive kids.. really reminds me a lot of me as a first year grad student. I remember my first supervisor telling me that I need to be more vocal. That I have to participate more in discussions regarding clients, and provide suggestions of activities and strategies to help our clients achieve their goals. I also remember feeling so damn lost during therapy, and wondering how the second year grad student I was shadowing could have it so together. She was confident, she gave her opinions to her supervisor, she was flexible and creative during therapy sessions. I remember thinking to myself "Will I be like that in my second year?"

I'd like to think that I have reached the level that my second year grad student did when she was in her second year. And I think I have. Which really makes me proud. Supervisory meetings about clients are now brainstorming and discussion sessions. Being with clients don't scare me or make me nervous anymore. I'm not afraid of planning just right before the session. And being in the preschool has definitely taught me that you can plan and plan activities, and most of the time, you have to tweak them. They're never going to work out exactly like how you planned! Also a good life lesson for me. I can plan and plan how I want my life to work out. But really, we all know all the plans are just going to go down the drain. Because life throws you scary curveballs sometimes that we just have to dodge and maneuver around.

Inspiring...

Be who you were born to be. You must follow your heart, and be who you were born to be. Some of us were born to be musicians—to communicate intricate thoughts and rousing feelings with the strings of a guitar. Some of us were born to be poets—to touch people’s hearts with exquisite prose. Some of us were born to be—to create growth and opportunity where others saw rubbish. And still, some of us were born to be or do whatever it is, specifically, that moves you. Regardless of what you decide to do in your lifetime, you better feel it in every fiber of your being. You better be born to do it! Don’t waste your life fulfilling someone else’s dreams and desires.

Hmm... ponder moment.

After a hectic day of therapy at the preschool (Yes, poop-cleaning day again today! Luckily, lumpy and not mushy poop), my supervisor tells me... "You're very nurturing, Suling. You give instructions in a friendly way, but not too friendly that the kids think they can step all over you."

I don't think my family will say the same about me. :)

Happy Birthday lil bro!

Happy birthday! :) Love you!

Preschool Moments

Super precious moments with the kids three mornings a week, keeps me refreshed. :)

Boy: Do you want to hold my hand?
Girl: (Looks at boy) Okay.
Girl and Boy holds hands and starts walking. Boy starts swinging girl's hand.

Girl 1 and Girl 2 rarely talks to each other, but does therapy together so are familiar with each other.
Me: Okay girls, lets hold hands and go to the next room!
Girl 1: (goes up to Girl 2) and holds hands with Girl 2
Girl 2: (looks uncomfortable and stares at hands, then slowly closes her hand around Girl 1's hands)
Girl 1 and Girl 2 walk down the hallway together. No word said to each other. Just walking, hand-in-hand.

Another "Oh Crap!" day!

Sometimes I'm really surprised at how bimbo I can be. Taught my student the word 'absent-minded' the other day. She asked me for an example. Couldn't think of anything except... "Well, I'm an absent-minded person" followed by a rant of reasons of why I'm absent-minded.

Yesterday, woke up sleepily at 7am to get choc milk from the fridge, and found that the carton of white milk on the top shelf had leaked overnight to the bottom shelf (the carton was leaning sideways and was pretty full). And of course, even though I only had 20 minutes to get ready and chomp on breakfast, I couldn't leave the milk lying splattered on the bottom shelf. I had to clean it up. So I did. Then I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to stop the milk from leaking. So in my mind, I thought "Oh, just pour out enough milk into cups then you can lean it down sideways like last time but it won't be so full that it would leak out of the cover." So I did that, poured milk into the biggest cup I had, but the carton was still too full, and still leaking. And we didn't have enough space in the fridge for multiple cups of milk.

So I stared at the fridge for the longest time, and thought "Oh, I'll stand up the carton of milk on the bottom shelf." But nope, it didn't fit. Even thought of moving entire shelves up a rung to make room for the carton on the bottom shelf... but didn't do that coz it took up too much effort (plus it was a rather stupid idea!) Finally, I just gave up, and leaned the milk the same position as before but on the bottom shelf, and then I put a paper towel underneath it to collect the leaking milk. I even considered trying to plastic wrap the cover area of the carton with a rubber band around it but neck of the carton was too shallow (plus it was also a stupid idea!).

Finally, when I came back after a loong day, I complained to my roommate about the milk leaking and about how I did not know what the heck to do with it. He looked at me strangely and said "What do you mean you didn't know what to do with it? Just put it standing up on the top shelf. It fit on the top shelf standing up!" And I looked at him blankly and said "It did? Why didn't I try that? I tried fitting it in all the shelves (middle and bottom) but not the top!" In my mind while problem solving, I kept thinking, I shouldn't put it on the top shelf coz it's going to keep leaking to the bottom and that was what I was trying to prevent. So I didn't even think of trying to fit it standing up on the top shelf.

What can I say about myself and what goes on in my head? Sigh. Nothing.

Because of my Super Fail milk crisis that morning, I forgot that I had to dress up for clinic in the evening. So I wore jeans and got to the Preschool and had an "Oh crap!" moment aloud. After preschool, walked really fast 20 minutes along the highway all the way back to my apartment, with the laptop for clinic coz I was too caught up with myself to ask my friend to take it back to the department for me. Sweated all the while walking because of course, it had to be hot and of course I had to be wearing two tops.

Ended up driving to campus, and being 15 minutes late for tutoring.

Then at the end of my day, while walking to catch the bus, I realized "Hey! I drove. My car is at the parking garage! I don't need to take the bus!!!" The day would have been soo  much worse if I actually took the bus back, walked into my apartment and realized that I left my car on campus.

On my wish list!

 

 Read this

I always loved the power of words and how we can use it to express our deepest feelings for another person. I wish I was better at writing so that I could write letters that make others tear up, that people would want to keep forever... I wish I could write letters that inspire others, that make people feel truly special... Sadly, my failure to describe my feelings usually gets in the way of writing a truly romantic love note, or a thank you friendship note, or even a note to my parents to say hi! This book is totally on my wishlist.