Here goes...

I completely forgot about my blog from 9 years ago until I googled myself and it appeared suddenly in my search. I just spent the last hour reading my old posts and chuckled to myself, remembering things I completely forgot about in an almost re-discovery.

I didn't even have kids 9 years ago. I lived in a different city,  in a different time zone, pre-COVID. There's so much missing in between that it would be impossible to recap my life from where I left off in San Diego as a newlywed to having kids and my life presently. So I'll just start with today.

Much like my grandmother and her fascination of garage sales, I live for thrift stores and bargains. On most Mondays, you can find me at this thrift store by my house in Elmwood Park because everything in the entire store is 50% off. I usually spend my time in the women's clothing section since they have cute dresses for $4-$5 but today I spent a good 30 minutes perusing puzzles, games, and toys for the kids. I didn't even push the cart near the women's clothing section which is a first for me.

Patrick (who is my oldest son, 7 years old on the brink of turning 8 with a very wiggly front tooth) discovered a plastic pirate ship, dark green tanks, and a plastic bag full of military-looking fake Legos. Since the toys were $2-4 I told him that I would get him whatever toys he wanted for his birthday. (He still owes me $8 from purchasing him a military set from DD's Discounts and his sugar mama, the tooth fairy, hadn't paid him for his last tooth since he lost it and he hasn't written her a note yet). 

Meanwhile, Alejandro sat on the floor playing with a random assortment of discarded toys Patrick pulled off the shelves. The goldmine I discovered was a stow and go Hot Wheels set for $2.50. He was thrilled his allowance money covered the cost of this worthwhile piece of plastic although I can almost guarantee you that he will throw his head back and audibly moan the next time I ask him to unload the silverware from the dishwasher- one of the few chores he has to do in order to earn his allowance. 

The treasures that I discovered were games that I played when I was younger that I thought my kids could enjoy- Battleship, Connect 4 and Headbanz (okay so the last game didn't come out when I was a kid but the others did). As I pushed my cart to pay, it was so overloaded that things started falling. I wasn't even really embarrassed since my loot was so great. I just asked Patrick to help me pick it up and stuff it back under the cart. He was like Rosalita from Goonies, kicking the cans of soup that fell from the torn grocery bags.

(Side note- I just spent 15 minutes trying to find the movie clip with Rosalita kicking the cans while Brandt is tied in a chair and got sucked into watching deleted scenes from Goonies among other things). I think I'll just quit while I'm ahead and write more another day.

This one time I went to Greece

I think I was a bit delusional when we flew into Athens.  I thought every city in Greece was like a scene in Mama Mia with dancing in the street and a donkey ride up to a white washed village followed by a visit to a club called the Parthenon.  Okay that last part was a dig on Shaq, but I really didn’t know what to expect especially given the recent economic unrest of Greece.

My husband, mother-in-law and I stayed with my husband’s family in Athens that consisted of a seventy-two year old man named Apostolos who spoke better German than English, a middle-aged woman named Despina who reminded me of Blanche Devereaux from the Golden Girls and her quiet older sister named Corelia.  They lived on different floors of an apartment building near Agios Eleftherios metro stop.   

Every evening we would listen to the news on the small television set in the living room which was in Greek.  I asked my husband’s great uncle Apostolos, “what are they saying?”  He answered very matter of factly, “they are talking about the economic situation in Greece.”

Later I would understand that new amounts of aid were given to Greece to avoid default but with that came more austerity measures including higher taxes, cutting pensions, laying off workers which lead to more strikes.  Constant images of Greek’s Minister of Finance Evangelos Venizelos flashed across the tv screen and he reminded me of John Candy and a sexier version of Jabba the Hut.

Meanwhile we stuffed our faces full of stuffed grape leaves, moussaka, pastitsio, and played the tourist.  We spent an afternoon in the hot sun walking along the ruins of the Parthenon while hearing stories of Greek mythology.  We visited an ancient olive tree with roots twisted around itself, saw marble bust after marble bust of Athena, visited the new Acropolis museum and saw a glorious sunset in Oia. 

In other parts of the city, a white haired shop owner installed an alarm since his store was broken into, air traffic controllers went on strike leaving passengers stranded, an older woman looked in a trash can for her stolen purse and medical tests, and thousands of protestors burned tax bills on the parliament steps.

On our last day in Athens, Pete’s family took us out to their neighborhood café and crowded twelve chairs around three small tables.  As we poured cloudy glasses of Ouzo and shared jokes in English amid a soccer game playing in the background, for a moment it was as though there was no political and economic turmoil.  We simply reveled in each other’s company, sharing a drink from across the Mediterranean sea.

This one time I wrote a newsletter for work about lasers

I set forth to learn the mystery of lasers just like Conan venturing out in the world discovering the riddle of steel.  Instead of a thief by my side, my tour guide was Charles Hubert, a Senior Staff Engineer at CVI Melles Griot.  He swiped me in the building and I entered an industrial-looking, open space with fluorescent yellow lights hanging overhead.  It was a cross between the hallways of my elementary school and my grandfather’s garage.  The linoleum floors were polished to a shine and the walls were lined with various charts that looked like they tracked productivity or sales.  It was three in the afternoon which is considered after hours so I only saw a handful of employees on my tour.  In close proximity of lasers you had to wear safety glasses and Charlie handed me a pair and told me not to look directly at the lasers lest they bore holes through my eyes. 

As we passed tubes of pink neon, Charlie explained that laser is an acronym which stands for light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation.  To put simply, light goes through a tube of neon gases which bounces around, gains energy and comes out at the end as a laser. 

We bumped into his one of his colleagues wearing fancy-looking safety glasses who showed me their blue helium cadmium lasers.  I asked what those lasers in particular did and he said that they created 3D representations of things before they are made out of metal.  I thought the laser melted the plastic but it actually has the opposite effect, it turns liquid plastic into solid plastic.  He explained that green lasers are used for eye surgery.  Yellow lasers are used for chemistry.  Red lasers are used for scientific applications like DNA sequencing or blood analysis and even lumber cutting.  Their lasers are also used in concerts, television shows and sporting events. 

In order to see how they actually make a laser, I had to wear a head bouffant, a surgical mask, latex gloves, shoe coverings and a smock that looked like my great aunt’s pajamas.  Charlie laughed and said I looked like a lunch lady.  Once we were ridiculously dressed, he led me in the DPSS work station which stands for diode pumped solid state lasers.  The room was really loud since they pump filtered air since they are more OCD than the Nicastro brothers.  He explained that their lasers can’t have any type of microscopic contamination or else it can change and block the action of the laser.  We met another colleague named Mark who looked even more ridiculous than I did since he had to wear a beard covering instead of a surgical mask.  He pointed to a laser work station that had a black square box the size of a small car battery with a tiny blue light inside.  Midgets and children must work there since the size of their instruments are so small and the optics and crystals are even smaller.  I asked Mark if there have been any laser injuries and he said that you can have minor degree burns on your hands and that papers have had holes burned through them. 

I took a deep breath and asked them my last question.  When I die and Crom asks me, what is the riddle of lasers, what shall I tell him?  They looked at each other and said, tell him the riddle is stimulated emission converting energy into a monochromatic beam of photons.  A smile crept on my lips.  Thank you, I whispered, knowing that I shall live forever in Valhalla.

This one time I needed to write

I haven't written in my blog in a long while and I don't have an excuse other than pure laziness.  I will try to rectify that especially that I have only days left of being thirty-one years old.  The thoughts of a thirty-one year old are much different than those of a thirty-two year old I imagine.


My family came to San Diego this past weekend to celebrate my birthday with me even though it's really this Saturday.  We spent a lot of time at the beach in Carlsbad which was like re-discovering the city given that I work in Carlsbad but don't really know the area apart from where I work, the gym and the outlets.  I'm an outlet fan, what can I say?  Aside from stuffing ourselves silly there were some really memorable moments which I'll share.


The hotel played a movie every Friday, Saturday and Sunday in their outdoor patio.  We watched The Lion King huddled under beach towels sprawled out in the grass against the night sky.  I wanted to sing the words to some of the songs but no one else was singing so I just whispered, "hakuna mata" to myself.  That particular song reminded me of my sister Cristina given that she sang that song at one of her school productions.  She used to practice so often we eventually knew most of the words to the song as well.  I could hear my father's laughter to the jokes in the song as though he were watching the movie for the first time.  "What's a motto?" asked Pumbaa.  "Nothing, what's a-motto with you?" said Timon. 


On Sunday we took a stroll along the beach with my two nephews in tow, my husband, my father and my sister Vanesa.  My mom had a headache so she opted to stay in the car.  We pushed my four month old nephew in his stroller and when he started protesting I decided to hold him in my arms and then when he got heavy I held him in the baby carrier also known as the baby bjorn.  (Which is actually quite fitting since he looks like a little German given his hair cut even though the company is Swedish.  I like to say Auf Wiedersehen to him because I think it's hilarious.  It's from this movie Bridesmaids and that quote never gets old).  So I held my little German nephew even though he's really Mexican and he seems so observant with those black marbles for eyes so I spoke to him in Spanish, pointing things out to him as though he understands everything.  I described things that were happening around us, pointed out birds, asked him questions, I was just his translator until he found the words himself.  His response?  He just giggled in delight.  

This one time I wrote a Father's Day Poem

I should preface this by saying that my father was out of the country during Father's Day so I just wrote him this poem a few weeks ago.  I cried writing it and he cried reading it which is a sign of a good poem to me.

A Poem For My Father

Long fingers push the back of my bicycle

Streamers fly in the wind

Skinny legs pedal as fast as they can

Crooked teeth expose a giant smile

Memories float to the surface in remembrance

Flat stones skip across an ocean sky

Baseballs thrown and caught in a grassy field

Small limbs undulate to dramatic music

You are my loving father

Human elevator

Over-complicated math tutor

Family genealogy instructor

And loving father

When my hands are wrinkled

And years have passed

My heart will burst in remembrance

Of twirling in white with you by my side

This one time I went to the beach

Today I decided to jog along the lovely stretch of beach in Del Mar near my apartment.  Sometimes I like to jog in the mornings during the week where bits of my story comes to me in little snippets.  I think the beach inspires me.  One time I went for a jog and saw seaglass on the sand and was touched.  I had read this book called "The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake" where the main character, this little girl, was described as seaglass by her mother.  Since then, the sight of seaglass makes me smile.

Today was more of a sight-seeing day since the beach was crowded with families and couples rather than the occasional jogger.  There was a young family on their way to the beach with Tommy Bahama chairs strapped to the parents' back.  They had two young girls with blonde hair so light it was almost white.  I couldn't help but notice that the youngest girl wore flip flops that were too big on her, as though they once belonged to her older sister.  I liked being close to them, as though I was somehow sharing an integral moment of their lives.

It was warm though the sun liked to hide behind the clouds most of the late morning.  As I jogged along the beach I noticed my surroundings.  There was a little boy about seven years old making a large W in the sand with his hand and I wondered how much sand he would get underneath his fingernails.  All that grit just to write in the sand.  Why not use a stick or your finger I wondered.  There was another family with two little girls although they were older, maybe five and seven.  They wore hats on their heads and bathing suits with a long sleeved top.  One wore pink and the other purple.  When the tide left, their father pointed in the sand and they quickly dug for what I can only imagine are sand crabs.

I remembered my own father showing my sisters and me how to find them.  They were so ugly but I liked how their legs tickled my hand.  I could almost remember those days at the beach when I was their age, burying our Barbies in the sand, making sand castles so huge you could sit in the middle of them.  The first thing my father would do was start digging a giant hole with our buckets.  Vanesa and I liked constructing the walls and getting the water.  Sometimes we'd get too much water and we'd have to re-construct the walls again.  I liked sitting in the middle of the castle and working from the inside out.  I would get so much sand inside my bathing suit but I didn't care.  I wonder if anyone would say anything if I brought a Barbie, a shovel and a pail to the beach and construct a giant sand castle all by myself.  I should try that sometime.

This one time I went to E3

There was this one time that I attended E3.  This one time was Tuesday, no it was Wednesday because no one wanted to go on the first day.  I rode the Amtrak train for what felt like the first time with my co-workers and time seemed to fly by.  There was a mother who sat next to us wearing hiking shoes, glasses and a short crop of grey hair who was on her way to Yosemite with her teenage daughter.  She spoke to my co-worker about her son who wants to work in video games.  Only he's a composer and wants to compose music for the games.  Later I found out that the best advice would be for him to strip out music from an existing video game and add his own.  Instead, his mother was told to surround himself with people in the industry that could offer him advice.

Before we arrived there were these NOS girls handing out energy drinks.  What struck me were their outfits - bright blue spandex dresses that resembled something I once put on my Barbie back in 1986.  Only their dresses showed more cleavage and were much shorter than the makers of Mattel could ever create.  As an added accessory, they wore cut out cheap-looking sunglasses to make them look nerdy.  I guess nerds like a woman in glasses.

Once inside it was sensory overload with loud explosions on gigantic television screens of multiple video games.  I got a headache from so much leaping out at me, demanding my attention.  Instead, I checked out the "booth babes" at E3 which were rumored to be hired models and beautiful women, maybe even strippers.  I was not particularly impressed.

In an effort to wrap up this blog I shall say this:  I'm glad I went but I may have had more fun playing Glee karaoke.  Next time I'll bring my cheerleading outfit.