Condom vending machines, anyone?

Eeek! I was watching an old rerun of Just Shoot Me this afternoon, and it was the episode where Finch gets driving lessons from Elliott and a huge, gigantic, very hairy (think cousin It), very sinister-looking tarantula crawls onto Finch's shoulder as he's driving! Good God, if that happened to me while I were driving, I'd be off somewhere lying on the side of the road in a ditch right now! Despite the fact that they never complain about your driving, furry, fuzzy spiders are not good company to have in the car, nosiree. Neither are reptiles. Yeah, there was this one time P'Ying found a gecko plastered against her window holding on for dear life as she sped along the tollway. Being the sympathetic softie that she is, she actually opened the window and let it seek refuge in her car. I have nothing against geckos (they aren't hairy, don't jump at you out of nowhere, and don't give birth to 300 babies at a time like spiders), but I wouldn't exactly let one into my car! But that's P'Ying for ya, she's such a sweetie.

~*~
There was a rather interesting debate on channel 9 last night. There were professors and students from various Thai universities discussing the necessity and appropriateness in having condom vending machines at universities. Yeah, that's right, condom vending machines! As you guys can probably imagine, it didn't really sit well with most of the Thai public. The poll indicated that 70% of the viewers were against the idea whereas only 30% were for it.

The profs who were for the idea talked about these condom machines being beneficial in lowering STDs, AIDS, and unwanted pregnancies amongst university students, whereas the profs who were against the idea argued that it would send out improper connotations and that students go to university to study and educate themselves, not to have sex. One student brought up a rather interesting point: she said that there aren't even any machines on campus selling tampons and pads, so why should there be vending machines selling condoms? Haha, anyway, things got pretty heated after a while.

The thing that intrigued me was that the majority of the students who participated in the debate were also against the idea. Despite the many changes in modern Thai society, they said that we are still a Buddhist and Asian nation and that we can't forget that our ancient traditions and morals still hold a higher priority and significance in comparison to such contemporary ideals and notions. They also drew comparisons between universities abroad (namely, the US) and how they don't even have such machines loitering around their university campuses because of it being downright unnecessary and inappropriate. I couldn't agree more. Take my uni, for example, if you were in dire need of a condom, you could always cross the street and pop by the 7-11 and buy a condom there.

So, what do you guys think? Are you for or against condom vending machines being placed at university campuses?

~*~
BTW, sorry, but I just had to add this : For all the ladies out there, here's a video clip - http://www.waaak.com/sound/malachiconcert.wmv - (3.21 MB, 4:36 minutes) from the Malachi showcase I went to a few weeks ago. You can hear a few clips from some of the songs he performed that night (and that gorgeous, gorgeous voice of his), as well as a few snippets from the interview with Miew where he talked about Thai and Irish people and his ideal kind of girl. Man, what a smoothie, that Malachi. And you gotta love that Irish accent, too!



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The Brimming Over With Randomness Entry #8,976

~*~

[ My Burnt Eggs ]

Me: "I tried cooking for Jason while you were gone."
Dad: "Yeah?"
"Yeah, good thing you came back in time before I accidentally poisoned him or something."
"That bad, eh? I told you to just order some pizza."
"Weeeell, I had good intentions."
"So, what happened?"
"I burned my eggs."
"You burned your eggs??? Does this mean no grandchildren for me...?"






Seeing as how I never miss a single episode of Jamie Oliver's Naked Chef show, and the fact that cooking and interior design shows are the types of shows I watch the most of, you would think that my cooking skills would at least be a fraction of a notch above "virtually defunct". Oh well, it's just one of those baffling mysteries of life, I suppose.






~*~


[ Cead Mile Failte to you, too, Malachi ]

Hey, guess what? While browsing through some Thai Malachi sites, I stumbled across a picture of myself and Malachi from the meet-and-greet session I nearly busted my ass racing to after class a few weeks ago. Someone must have taken it from behind without me noticing. Heh, not like it really matters because I probably wouldn't have even batted an eye if a flock of pigeons had flown over me and showered me with bird poop. (Believe it or not, this has actually happened to me before. Sad, huh.)


~*~


[ Jay Chou Tix ]

Yes, Ocean_Blue, I finally got 'em! YEEEAAH!

Choosing the seats actually took quite a while. Job and I had a rather lengthy discussion about the whole seating thing whereby Job would critically assess the locality of our seats in relation to Jay's position on stage. I won't go into great detail about it, especially since Job made the conversation take a sharp turn towards some rather racy, risque topics (hey, kids might be reading this), but I can tell you that it, uh, involved a little something about Job hoping we get a good view of Jay - down there. Yeah, apparently, to him, he says that that's the whole point in even going at all.

Anyway, Job didn't want to get floor seats because he said that he didn't want to have to stand on his feet for two hours and risk getting squashed to smithereens by sweaty, teenage teenyboppers. Despite my relentless whining protests about me not minding two hours of standing (for Jay, I'd run two hours in heels) and being squished to tiny Lynn particles by all the teenies, he still insisted on avoiding the floor seats.

I guess that means I can forget about indulging in two hours of teenage teenism as originally planned. Sigh.


~*~


[ Kim Jong Il ]

Akira's going to Korea! That lucky duck. He said that if he has time he's going to stop by the North Korean border and wave to his uncle (the one that's a secret spy for Kim Jong Il) over on the other side. I told him to be extra cautious because he could run the risk of getting abducted or hit by a tester nuclear bomb (or both), but he assured me that he would be fine, especially since Kim Jong Il and his uncle are so chummy and all. But don't worry, Akira, if I don't see you on MSN in a week, I'll make sure to alert the authorities. (Note: Akira's uncle isn't really a spy for KJI. It's just a stupid inside joke of ours. He doesn't even have any uncles living in Korea, much less North Korea.)

Anyway, with all this talk about Kim Jong Il, I just had to share this. It's from this guy's Live Journal blog. He pretends to be Kim Jong Il and has made-up conversations with Bin Laden, Bush, and Cheney. I haven't checked it out for a while, but I just did after talking to Akira and, boy, it's SO pee-in-your-pants, laugh-out-loud funny.


~*~


[ Musical Tidbit ]

Nicole Theriault's Mai Mee Hed Pone song is so pretty. While the lyrics might sound a little cliched in English, it sounds so heartfelt - poetic, even - when sung in Thai. Hrmm, I guess it's kind of like swearing; cuss in English and it sounds vulgar, cuss in French and it sounds like you're spouting words of amour.

Merde, tu me fais chier! See what I mean?


~*~


Boy, and I thought I couldn't get any more random than this.


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About Lynn the Carpool Mom and the Horny Spatula

This past weekend was a parentless weekend. My mom left for a week-long trip to Japan on Friday and my dad went to Saraburi for a weekend trip with a bunch of old high school friends. As the only mature and responsible adult around (*cough, cough*), I was left in charge of the house as well as various other duties, such as being my brother's personal chauffeur.


I woke up at 5:30 AM on Saturday morning, spent an hour and a half in early morning traffic driving J to school for his Catholicism retreat, and another two long hours on my @rse driving back before finally reaching home at around 11 AM with nada feeling left in my behind. I wasted time on the internet, studied a bit, and at around 2 PM, climbed back into my car and got stuck in another two hours of traffic as I again drove back to J's school to pick him and three of his friends up.


Now, I have absolutely nothing against 14-year old boys and girls. After all, 14 wasn't that long ago. Just because I turned 21 a couple of days ago doesn't mean that 14 is so very foreign to me and I don't remember what it was like to be 14. I, however, am not too fond of 14-year old girls who, upon stepping into my car and hearing the first few notes of Jay Chou's Ye Ye Pao De Cha song, emit piercing, banshee-like wails of glee that do not abate in the slightest for the entire hour and a half journey to their house in Ladprao. I also don't like it when hormonal 14-year old girls jump and bounce around in their seats to Jay Chou's rapping because it makes my car shake up and down like a rabid kangaroo on steroids. And I especially don't like it when they reach forward from the backseat - sharply elbowing my left cheek in the process - and jab away at the stereo buttons so that they can go to track 4, Dragon Fist, which simply gets them bouncing and springing away even more (think a dozen kangaroos on steroids plus a pogo stick). Jason's other friend (we'll call him Bob) was much more civilized in comparison and thankfully devoid of any signs of adolescent barbarism. Indeed, he turned and yelled at the girls (we'll stick to the mundane names and call them Jill and Jan) and told them to "shut the hell up!!" and to "stop shaking the f*cking car!!".


Bob's my hero.


So, now I know how carpooling moms feel. I know I probably sound like a stuffy old fart, but haven't Jill and Jan's parents ever taught them any manners?


Anyway, after I woke up on Sunday morning (if noon is considered morning), I decided to put my culinary skills efforts to the test and make J some brunch. I'd talked to Patrick the night before and he'd suggested eggs, so I took up his suggestion because, pfft, eggs are as easy-peasy as they get, right?


Apparently not.


(My mom took the digital cam with her to Japan, so I had to resort to other methods instead. Here it is: Lynn's Cooking Fiasco [an MS Paint story])



It started out innocently enough.

A simple frying pan and a couple of eggs.







Cracked those babies and as the first egg started frying away, I thought to myself, hey, this isn't so hard after all!








Then the spatula I accidentally poked the yolk a little too hard and, uh, well, it broke.
Damn yolk went slipping and sliding all over the place. :(







Evil, evil spatula!

J and I dubbed this "the spatula with pointy horns prone to poking yolks", aka "the horny spatula".




Sigh, but that's okay, we'll just have scrambled eggs instead! Yeah, no problemmo, just whip it a bit here, and toss it around a bit there...

Is that the phone?
Doooorrrkk! Get the phone!! Where are yoooo??
Forget it, I'll get it myself.




15 minutes later.

Damn.
What's the number to Pizza Hut?






I think I'll leave cooking to the professionals from now on and slink back to burning making toast instead.


Last bit of randomness: I love Dido's Life For Rent album. White Flag, Life For Rent, Mary's in India, and Sand in My Shoes have been running around my head non-stop this past week and so far there haven't been any signs of them leaving anytime soon. Dido's voice is soothing and the lyrics simple and honest. Melancholy has never sounded quite so achingly beautiful.



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Weird Googlism

The one time I actually check my sitemeter stats, I come across this:

(Search words are circled in pink.)


Tsk tsk. Those naughty Italians.


Isn't this where the Amish live?
Tsk tsk. Those naughty Amish.


Erm, no comment.


Telling from their search words, imagine the immense disappointment they must have felt when they ended up stumbling across my boring l'il blog instead.



I watched Thai TV for the first time in a while today. I usually watch UBC (the local cable TV network that bombards us with more Americanisms than we can possibly handle), but I was bored watching Mariah Carey embarrass herself in Glitter, a balding James Van der Beek in Dawson's Creek, and the whole Wacko Jacko fiasco on Entertainment Tonight. If you've ever watched Thai lakhons and commercials, then you'll know just how cheesy it can get. Anyway, nevertheless, it's always a rather amusing experience. (Note: Not all Thai commercials are corny, but I just picked the cream of the crop here. )




That extra-large cell phone is almost as big as her hair. Almost.










Man, I want a drumset like that!







This one isn't really cheesy, but it's cute.




*whistling* Da di da da da.... I'm oh so bored.










Hey, where's that whistling coming from?










It's me Dad, me!






Sigh. Yeah, you guessed correctly. I'm so incredibly bored.



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The Computer With a Bad Case of Cooties

After class yesterday, I popped by the computer lab in the science building at my uni to check my email. I didn't really expect there to be a vacant computer since the lab's usually brimming over with students after 4 PM, but lo and behold, luck was on my side! Sitting in one very dark lonely corner was a wee little computer all alone and neglected in a room full of buzzing students clickity-clacking away at their respective terminals. A vacant computer? Now that's unusual, I thought. However, as I got closer and the computer's desktop wallpaper became clearer (I wasn't wearing my glasses), I suddenly realized why.


A-ha! Someone had changed the desktop wallpaper to a picture of a very naked, very busty, very, uh, explicitly posed buxom blonde. Well phooey, I said (not aloud, though), what a big, bad waste of a perfectly good computer. I deduced that perhaps some of the shy Thais had found this to be a tad embarrassing, and had therefore decided to steer clear of it. Not me, nosiree, I plopped down and started happily clickity-clacking away in simultaneous harmony with everyone else in the room.


Today, I again stopped by the computer lab after class to check my mail, and whaddaya know? The same wee little computer that I had been using the day before was again left all alone in the same dark corner of the again filled-to-the-brim computer lab. Sympathising with the poor computer's lamentable plight, I said to myself, something must be done! And so I marched up to the computer, checked my email (and got a little sidetracked blog-surfing and xanga-ing), and finally changed the desktop wallpaper to this. How's that for a buxom babe? Yes, well anyway, I'm happy to say that the computer is now cootie-free. Hopefully people will start using it now so that it can finally live out the rest of its days with a purpose.


On another random observational note: As I was driving to uni this morning, I stopped at a red light (the same one where I spotted the helmet-banger a few weeks ago) and briefly glanced over at my rearview mirror. In the pick-up truck behind me was a man FLOSSING HIS TEETH. Yes, that's right, you heard me - he was FLOSSING his TEETH. As if that wasn't bad enough, he actually wiped whatever debris he was able to dig out of his mouth onto his shirt! Ewww. I know many fellow Bangkokians have rather tight schedules, especially with the chaotic traffic and hectic city life, but c'mon, please rid your oral orifices of your morning toast in the nice warm privacy of your home!


Pfft, and men complain about women applying makeup in the car.



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Guess who's comin' to BKK?

Thanks, everyone, for all the wonderful birthday comments! Unfortunately, I'm sad to say that I didn't get a chance to do anything wild or crazy last night like have an unruly party involving 50 crates of beer and a dwarf (ehh, inside joke). I instead spent the majority of yesterday evening being a "good student" and did some very last-minute cramming (damn you, procrastination!!) for the test I had today (which I think went pretty well). Yeah, and in addition I also have a presentation to prepare for for tomorrow, but I promise to do some mad celebrating next week!


After reading what everyone has said about the big two-one, turning 21 doesn't seem so bad after all. I guess the only major downside to it, as markboonya says, is that biological clock of mine and the fact that it's now quickly ticking away in conjunction with my swiftly diminishing ova. Hahaha. And no, Mark, I didn't get a roti-layered cake. I also didn't know that roti was considered an aphrodisiac (gee, beween the Oxytocin bit and this, you sure are a wealth of information). Is it really? Can Dr. Chim-Chim please verify this for me? Man, and to think of all the times I used to buy roti by the dozen for my ah-ma when she was alive.


This morning as I was driving to class, my cousin May called me. In my rather sluggish, rather drowsy state (I'm not much of a morning person as it usually takes me at least 3 hours to fully awaken), I picked up the phone and answered, only to have her scream my poor ear off ("LYYYYYYYYYNN!!!!!!"). She scared the crap outta me because I thought that she had some bad news about a relative or something, especially since the last time she ever called me on my cell phone was last October to tell me that her dad had passed away. So yeah, I was anticipating bad family-related news or news that she had lost a limb or two (it certainly sounded like it), but, no, instead she demanded that I turn on the radio to 88.0. As I fumbled for the buttons to switch off my Jay Chou CD and turn the station to 88.0, my impatient cousin decided to break the news to me herself:

"JAY. CHOU. IS. COMING. TO. BANGKOK. thisDecember23rdforaliveconcertatImpactArena!!!!"

(AHHHHHHH)


If you know me or have ever had a 2-second conversation with me, then you will know that, as a rather big Jay Chou fan, I couldn't have been more thrilled.


(Cue insane screaming from two psychotic cousins.)



Why does Jay Chou look like he has Britney Spears boobies in this pic???
(That sneaky l'il fella, he must be getting secret tips from Fabio!)

So I finally got to class, and as I was waiting for the prof to arrive, my phone rang again and this time it was Job, a close friend of mine who's a pretty rabid Jay Chou fan himself. Insane screaming that could have easily rivaled May's ensued (Job's gay to the bone), and boy was he loud! (The two guys sitting in front of me actually heard him and glanced over to see what all the commotion was about.)


As if that wasn't enough excitement for one day, when I got home this evening my maid, P'Sai, came racing to me from the backyard hollering, "Jay Chou's coming to Thailand! Jay Chou's coming to Thailand! And so is Jerry Yan from F4! Jerry Yan from F4!" I think she had to repeat everything twice because it hadn't all quite sunk in yet.


Later, another friend of mine rang me up to tell me the big news as she drove home from class. In her ecstatic, rather muddled and incoherent state, she nearly ran over a guy on a motorcycle and so I had to try to calm her down: "If you run someone over and get convicted of manslaughter then you won't be able to go to the Jay Chou concert." It worked like a charm and I'm glad to say that she got home in one piece.


So yeah, with all the overflow of female hormones and fanatical teenybopperness, it's been a pretty interesting day.


The news about Jay Chou's BKK concert has been all over the news and on virtually every single radio station. May says the tix are gonna be selling like hotcakes, and so we have to hurry and buy them if we want to get good seats.

I'm okay now. Really. I've pretty much got all of this morning's lunacy out of my system now.

Well, almost all of it.




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The Big Two-One

At around 5 PM Orlando time today, I will officially hit the big two-one.

So what does turning 21 years old - I mean, 21 years young - entail?


Entering clubs and bars can now be done legally. Not that I have never entered a club or bar before, but this doesn't really excite me since I don't really possess a particular fondness for clubs and bars (public vomitting and cheesy pick-up lines don't really appeal to me).

Consuming alcoholic beverages can now be done without fear of federal prosecution. Again, my fondness for alcoholic beverages is virtually non-existent and so I couldn't care less, but oh well.







Can I still buy music by poppy, catered-to-teens, manufactured artists (if you can even call them that) like Britney, Blue, Westlife and Atomic Kitten?







I don't think I should stop and casually flip through Teen People magazines at the bookstore anymore, even if I take great pains to make sure that I'm incredibly inconspicuous about it.

I will no longer be held back by "No one beyond 21 permitted beyond this point" signs.

I have now reached the last milestone of adolescence and youth. Before you know it, 30 will be here, and then 40, 50 and 60. After that comes 70, then 80 and 90, after which it won't really matter anymore because I probably will have already lost count and will be the crazy granny at family reunions who goes around saying things like, "I look like I did when I was 73! I haven't aged a bit! Ho, ho!". (I'll probably also be a couple thousand neurons short, thanks to my stupid air conditioner filter and whatever suspicious substance it is that I've been inhaling from its leaky vents. The air-con guys are coming to fix it tomorrow, by the way).

As a teen, everyone looks forward to one day turning 21. Once you finally hit 21, what do you look forward to now? Turning 51? (No offense to anyone out there who might actually be 51. )

I'm a legal adult now. Why does that sound so incredibly old and ancient to my ears?

The ominous "forbidden" element of adulthood will no longer be there. As it turns out, adulthood doesn't hold much mystique after all.



Even thinking for the slightest second that guys like Zac Hanson possess the smallest modicum of hotness now makes me sound like a pedophile.





I guess this means I can't have conversations with the Powerpuff Girls anymore, huh. Oh well, I shall now be forced to live vicariously in the world of cartoons by means of my 7-year old cousin, Nina.


Anyway, whatever the case, I'm psyched to finally be 21. Yeah!



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