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Daily Thoughts
July 29, 2003
You know what? Some commercials are great. I mean, not many of them, but there are
a few select commercials that are just absolutely wonderful. Within this category falls all
of the Folgers ads. I don't even like coffee, but if I did, I would certainly support the
Folgers brand. Why? Because they have consistently come out with catchy jingles! I have
two downloaded on my computer, and they're great!
My favorite commercial ever is that old Folgers ad with the tap dancer who gets up, walks
downstairs, makes coffee, gets inspired by her morning brew, and starts tap dancing in her
kitchen. I mean, how great is that? Anyways, during the commercial, there is a special
jingle which corresponds to the caffeine-consuming dancer. I love that song.
However, I have been unable to find the jingle to my favorite Folgers commercial. In fact,
I have been unable to find any evidence of its existence anywhere on the internet.
This is a shame, because it's a good jingle that has been lost since the ad stopped running quite
awhile ago.
Luckily, I happened to have committed the lyrics to memory! Yes, I really love this jingle that
much -- or maybe I'm just a book of lyrics, I don't know. Anyways, here they are, for the
first time (at least to my knowledge) being placed on the internet for the betterment of the
world wide web:
The morning sun breaks through,
music and dance calling you.
You need that mountain grown lift,
before you share your gift.
Now the rhythm and sound,
making your heart pound.
The best part of waking up,
is Folgers in your cup!
Also, please note that throughout the second stanza, there are some pretty nice accompanying
tap rhythms. Anyways, that's all. I just wanted to share my favorite commercial with
everybody... If any of you happen to come across it while downloading music, let me know.
But, in the meantime, I recommend the Foglers song by Rockapella. Good stuff.
July 23, 2003
Upon arriving home from my mallet lesson today (which I enjoyed very much!), I
noticed a small group of children at the house across the street selling lemonade. Well,
I decided to support the kids, and I bought a cup of their diluted lemon concoction. Hey,
what's 25 cents when it comes to ensuring the existence of neighborhood lemonade stands?
Plus, it reminded me of the time when Clarissa and I would set up our own lemonade
stands. Although, we were smarter, and we set ours up on the corner so we could get the
traffic from Sundance as well as from our own small neighborhood. We also made up song and dance
routines which we performed to increase the appeal of our product. Yeah, those were
the good old days...
Well, if the kids across the street had performed a song for me, I might have just bought
two cups of gross watery lemonade. Kids these days have no sense of business! I guess I
should just be happy that they're sticking to the traditional lemonade rather than homemade
perfume which burns, right Christine?
July 19, 2003
Yesterday Becky, Cassandra, and I went to Summer Youth Theater's production of Les
Miserables at Poway Performing Arts Center. It was a very well put together show,
and I enjoyed it immensely. And, aside from the normal opening night glitches (squeaking
sets, occasional line mess-ups, fire alarms, building evacuations, and the like), it ran
very smoothly.
As we first entered the theater to find our seats, we were greeted with a haze of theatrical
fog setting the mood for the musical. The show started and was progressing quite nicely until
the third musical number, "I Dreamed a Dream." As Fantine reached her hand up and began to
deliver the final closing note of the song, the microphone cut out and white lights around
the theater began to flash while a siren-like sound was emitted. I, having never seen the
show before, was not sure whether or not this was an intended part of the production.
However, seconds later when the disaster recording informed us to please proceed calmly to the
nearest exit, I realized that this probably was not part of the show.
So, after safely making our way outdoors, we were instructed to move away from the building,
you know -- in case it suddenly exploded we had to be protected from the flying shards of
glass and other debris. So, taking refuge on a low wall we sat and waited... perhaps a
little too lightheartedly discussing the possible threats that were inflicting the building.
After a little while, the fire truck arrived and they checked out the theater and deemed it
all clear for us to re-enter the facility.
As we entered the theater (for the second time) to find our seats, an announcement
was made apologizing for the inconvenience and explaining what had happened. Apparently
the theatrical fog had accidentally triggered the (uncovered!) smoke alarms. But, we already
knew this. Cassie had told us quite earnestly outside that she was sure the fog is what caused
the disruption. Although Becky is still convinced that it was an earthquake...
So, after experiencing that little bit of DRAMA, I must mention that I was quite proud of myself,
my friends, and my fellow audience members. I mean, nobody panicked, nobody was trampled, and
everybody made it safely outdoors. Even the little kids seemed unperturbed by the disturbance
as they played tag on the grassy slopes. All of those fourth period fire drills must have really
payed off...
Anyways, the rest of the show was great. Everybody did a great job, especially Tara, Amanda, and Courtney!
You guys rocked! And that revolving stage was super cool, although you have to be careful to not fall over
as it starts moving and stops... Yeah, well, great show!
July 16, 2003
So, I just got home from my first informal percussion lesson. To sum it up, I stunk.
But... I also had so much fun! Although, due to an unfortunate set of circumstances, we
could not actually work on mallets today, there was plenty of stuff to do with just a
practice pad and sticks. I'm not quite sure what all I learned today... so many things to
remember! But, I'll practice whatever I can. Anyways, can't wait until my next "lesson"!
July 14, 2003
It's just another manic monday...
Summer is an interesting season. I spend so much of my time doing essentially nothing while
all the days blur together. On the rare occcasion that I do actually remember that it is, in
fact, Monday, I experience the odd feeling that I ought to be in school learning something.
But, I'm not in school. And I'm not learning anything. So, what have I been doing
lately? Plenty.
On Thursday, I finally saw the movie Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring for the
first time ever. And, considering its sheer length, I count this as quite an accomplishment.
It was pretty good. I like the elves -- but, of course I would! Oh, and after ballet,
I (excitingly enough) bought butter.
Friday was a fun day. Why? Because I went to the zoo! I went in the company of my mom, brother,
two great-aunts Judi and Colleene, my foster cousin Josie and her sister Patty, and Becky
(who, had not previously had the pleasure of meeting this portion of my extended
family). Until this recent visit, I never fully realized just how many great photo opportunities
there are at the zoo. I guess it's just one of those things you have to experience firsthand
before you are aware of it. Every ten feet or so, Becky and I would hear the dreaded phrase.
"Let's take a picture!" Although the tempting response was, "Let's not," we agreed and, as
a result, I have a couple of zoo pictures to post... that is, when I finally get around to
making my pictures page...
The zoo actually proved to be quite the educational experience. I learned that WASH, although
commonly misunderstood to be a verb for cleansing your hands after exiting the petting corral,
is actually an acronym! We Always Say Hi! I also learned that sharing your report card with
a boy is an obvious big deal in the sixth grade, back massages given by fourth graders hurt,
sound effects make secret handshakes just oh-so-much cooler, never join a club unless you
have the power to make the rules, and when half of an amphitheater's occupants are staring
at you, pretend they aren't there and do the secret clap and handshake anyways -- it'll make
them jealous that they aren't in the Friendship Club.
Moving on to Saturday, guess what I saw! Pirates of the Caribbean! It was so good.
I would certainly not mind seeing it again. It was hilarious. And, it had great music...
which, oddly enough isn't being released until the 22nd? Oh well, anyways, if you haven't
seen the movie, you really should.
Saturday evening, after Pirates, Bridget, Becky, Cassie, and I all went swimming at Bridget's
dad's place. That was, well... interesting. Just thought I'd throw that in here.
Anyways, yesterday I basically did nothing productive, but that's okay. It's summer. And
now, today being Monday and all, my weekly routine of dance classes resumes. An exciting
life, I know. Just thought I'd fill you all in on what I've been doing. Don't know why,
bored I guess... and feeling a little guilty about not being able to think of anything
entertaining to write about. Oh well, you'll have to just be content with hearing about my
daily life.
July 9, 2003
Arg! Bet you can guess what movie came out today! Yup, that's right, Pirates of the
Caribbean! Not to worry Becky, although I was unable to go see it today, I was
definitely in good hands. Not only was I at the beach (very close to the pirate's natural
habitat -- the ocean), but I was also in the company of several other avid pirate lovers!
Seriously Becky, you should make a pirate club with some of the people I met from UCHS. I
never thought it to be even possible for anyone to rival your love of pirates... you'd be
surprised... crazy stuff man. Anyways, I'll write more about Pirates after I go see it.
Until then, go wash out your chumbuckets mateys!
July 6, 2003
I went to the fair today! Whoo hoo! In case you couldn't tell, I had a lot of fun.
To quickly sum up my day; I ate, danced, browsed some exhibits, ate, watched the hypnotist
show (yay Nicole!), got some food to eat during the Recycled Percussion performance, took a
stroll through some more exhibits, and, oh yes, ate some more. If you want to read some more
details of my fair experience, check out my dance page.
Okay, just in case you guys haven't noticed, I've added some more updates. While I've changed
several small things around on various pages, the main things are the addition of the archives
on the left navigation bar. From now on, previous month's postings will be kept there. Also,
the Family link is now activated and ready for viewing. The Pictures link has also been created,
but at this time there are no pictures posted. I have a lot of pictures to add, I just haven't
had a chance to get around to it yet. Please be patient and check back often. I'm hoping to
have some pictures up by tomorrow evening at least -- but no promises. Well, those are the main
updates, but as I mentioned above, I have made a couple of smaller changes around the site,
so be sure to check out the older pages often as well as the new ones.
July 5, 2003
Play ball! The words echoed throughout the massive stadium as the players took their
positions on the field. And me? I was sitting up in section 38 with Cassandra, her
dad, and Becky. Yes, I went to the Padres vs. Giants baseball game at Qualcomm stadium.
I realize that I am not the biggest baseball fan or anything, but I still had
a lot of fun! And even though I don't watch sports all that often doesn't mean that I don't
like to when the situation arises. Plus, throw in a couple of my closest friends and you
can't go wrong!
Although I had to make a conscious effort to not refer to the crowd as the audience and other
such blunders, I think I did quite well keeping up with the lingo of the game. I even picked
up some new expressions too! "Hey Cassie, did you just see that great rammycackle down on the
field?" Even though I was able to follow what was going on, I'm not quite so sure about
Becky... in reference to a strike out, she responds, "what's that?" Okay, okay, so she was
just kidding, but it sure had Cassie fooled. But, just in case there was something that we
didn't understand, the lady in the row in front of us was more than happy to answer our questions.
In fact, on several occasions she did -- even if we didn't ask her.
Well, in case you don't follow baseball very closely and didn't know, Padres won the game.
Whoo hoo! I suppose they did a great job. Although, those security guards are who really
made the game great... Anyways, if anybody wants to go to another game ever, I sure wouldn't
mind, I had a blast! Yeah, so let me know. "Take me out to the ballgame!" Hehe...
July 4, 2003
I've had a great day! It's hard to explain what exactly made it such a good day,
because I'm not totally sure myself. But, undoubtedly it has been the best day I've had for
quite awhile. And, to top it all off, it's also a holiday!
So, today being the Fourth of July and all, I went to the annual "Spirit of the Fourth" parade
in Rancho Bernardo. Although the content of the parade did not vary much from the previous
years that I've attended, it was still pretty good. In fact, it was so good that I
saw it twice. (Well, more like I watched it all the way through at the beginning of
the route and then, once it ended, I crossed over to the end of the parade route to see the last
half a second time). Raymond rode his unicycle and juggled in the parade again this year. I
believe this was his ninth year participating... impressive, huh? Hehe, although this year he got the privilege
of being positioned directly in front of the Poway band. Yep yep yep. Well, as
cool as it was to see my brother almost be trampled by the entire Poway band, I was actually more
interested in watching the Mt. Carmel band. Why? Because Cassie was marching quads
in it of course! I'd just like to take this opportunity to say that she rocked! And, so did
the rest of the band too. Hehe, go MC! Anyways, those were pretty much the highlights of my parade
experience... that, and getting a free mini-flag and a jolly rancher! Gotta love free stuff...
Anyways, my post-parade plan was to go home and take a nap. However, as it turned out, my
family was invited to a block party on my street. So, since I had never been to a block party
before, I decided that it could be an interesting experience, and so I headed over with the
rest of my family to the end of the street to join in the festivities and to acquaint myself
with my neighbors. Yeah. That was fun, for awhile... a little while. Not to say I have dull
neighbors or anything, in fact there are a lot of interesting characters on my street. It may
seem like I'm rather anti-social, but I'm really not. It's just that sitting in the sun
listening to discussions of broken water pipes, floor tiles, and solar tubes isn't terribly
high on my list of entertaining activities. So, I politely excused myself to return home
and read Great Expectations on my comfy, shady patio swing in my backyard with
my cats. That was nice. Sitting, gently rocking back-and-forth with Allie perched on my
lap while I became immersed in my novel... until the phone rang. I suppose I wouldn't have
really minded extracting myself from my comfortable position if the phone call was for me. But, as you
can probably guess, it was not. It was actually for my brother... who, was still at the
block party with my mom and dad. So, after Victor informed me that he would call back in
about ten minutes, I found myself trudging down the street, going back to the block party
to give my brother the message. Running into Jeanette along the way, it was unavoidable to
briefly reminisce. All we needed was Clarissa and it would've been like reliving my entire
childhood life... Anyways, I managed to escape (I feel kinda bad for using such a harsh word
here... but yeah, I escaped -- you'd have to know Jeanette) and I retreated back to my home.
After reading a couple more chapters in my book, I decided to brave the inexplicable heat of
my computer room and view the digital parade pictures that my mom took earlier today and catch
up on my computer correspondence (email!). Then, at about 8:40 we headed out to Mira Mesa to view
the amazing fireworks display that they put on each year.
Now, it's a funny thing about me and fireworks... it seems that every year I subconciously
decide that I have some strong sort of dislike torwards fireworks. And, every year I prove
myself wrong. Maybe I just forget each year, or maybe I'm just annoyingly contradictory.
Neither option seems great, so I'm putting it here in writing to remind myself for next year:
I, in actuality, love fireworks. They're gorgeous! Oh, especially those gold
sparkly ones that kinda drip down, trickling through the sky. And the ones that make that
cool static-like sound when they go off... although, I tend to like anything that makes a cool
static-like sound... hmm. Anyways, back to fireworks. Pretty patterns of combusting materials
against a dark, starry night conveniently placed with corresponding sappy music. *sigh* Makes
me smile just recalling it. Yeah, I know, I know... I said I didn't like fireworks like four
hours ago or something... I guess I'm just a hypocrite. Sorry.
Anyways, after fireworks, we stopped into Target and I purchased my first CD since 2001. I
suppose I'm one of those people who abuses the free online music and CD burners that all the
record industries hate... Oh well, I don't care, as long as I get my music! Well, as I
previously mentioned, the last CD I bought was way back in 2001 and that was the Jewel's
This Way album. Tonight, I bought Jewel's newest CD, 0304. Since I've been
listening to it while working on my page all this time, I've heard each track about twice through.
And, I like it. A lot. Yes, while I do still prefer her older songs off of Pieces of You
and Spirit, this album is not bad -- unlike many of the online reviews suggested.
Yes, she has changed her style to a more upbeat-pop sound, but can you blame her? I'm sure
she would like to remain successful in the music industry, and to do that, you have to change
with the times. I think some of the slams against her change are totally uncalled
for. Face it, no matter what her style, she can pull it off. Why? Because she can sing, and
her lyrics maintain a sense of meaning. And who can deny it? Lyrics make the song. I digress,
I just felt I had to throw this in here. Gotta defend my favorite singer now, don't I?
Well, to conclude, I hope everybody had a great day -- I know I did! I know I should close
with some sort of patriotic phrase or something, but I can't think of any that wouldn't sound
too corny in this sort of context. So, I guess you'll just have to be content with this:
Happy 4th of July!
July 2, 2003
I feel slightly obligated to offer something to my loyal page-viewers to encourage their
routinely visits to this site. However, since I haven't much felt like writing anything
lately (blame it on the season... who wants to write during summer?) I guess you will have to be
kept content with semi-regular page updates.
I added a couple of new quotations and a link to Xie Dan's page. Also, I added a whole new
section of "Random Writings" which you can find to the left under the "Other" category.
(Cassie, I think you will be relatively pleased with the content of this new page) Anyways,
feel free to email me helpful suggestions or other ways I can make this page better or more
entertaining. In the meantime, just enjoy what I have so far. Also, for your information,
any links that are unable to be clicked aren't broken, I just haven't gotten around to
making those pages yet.
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