From Soho Down to Brighton

What do England and New York State have in common? Location names! I've been to both SoHos and neither Brighton. I'm sure if I ever got bored enough, I could make a more exhaustive list, but I'll go with the Who's list for now (yes, it's Pinball Wizard).

Chinese New Year Parade pics

 

So much has happened since I last posted!  Mostly that I went home, I suppose.  But that's a lot in and of itself.  For my mom's 50th birthday, my dad flew me home.  You might be wondering why I didn't mention that before this point, but that would have ruined the SURPRISE!  That's right, in addition to planning the shindig for Friday night, my dad and I kept secret that I was coming home in time to go to it.  Even though I had some major travel problems as New york was experiencing a rather serious blizzard, we still didn't tell.  I walked in the door just in time to get a "happy birthday" in before midnight.  I had a bit of a whirlwind weekend at home, but I got to see a lot of people, including family and family friends.  Saturday brought a visit to Zearing and grandparents and cousins and pizza, all of which were quite lovely.  The whirlwindiness of the weekend was balanced by the fact that all the activities were relaxing things like hanging out with family and catching the play at the Civic Center.

Visiting in Zearing

Besides going home, I made it to Chinatown for the parade (a week after actual Chinese New Year).  It was pretty cool, nothing too unexpected, but I have some pictures so you can feel like you were there.

the hill in Central Park where you most recently saw children sledding

a different, but similarly snow-free, area of CP

Beyond that, I've been getting used to having hobbies instead of college-style activities. I'm not a huge fan of meta ("an X about X", so blogging about blogging, a TV show about TV shows, etc), but blogging has definitely become one of my hobbies.  I love reading blogs, whether they're by people I know, sources of information, or a peek at something interesting.  Google Reader keeps track of all of them for me so that I don't waste too much energy on them.  But I really do enjoy that with advancing technology, individual people more and more have the ability to create a space of their own.  While it can be fun to read books like Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice and fantasize about what it would be like to live like those characters, realistically, most people in those generations spent a majority of their time just trying to get by or working for the service of people richer than them.  (Just like it's easy to say I would have opposed the Nazis if I had lived in 1930s-1940s Germany or fought for civil rights in the 1960s, but really, how do I know?  I'm sure a lot of perfectly good people living in those times ended up on the wrong side of history, and I have no way of knowing where I would have fallen.  Anyway, back on topic...).  But now, technology has leveled (some) playing fields, and everyone can have a space that's their own through social networking sites, blogs, youtube, etc.  Obviously that has a downside (Aldous Huxley's A Brave New World highlights some of the dangers of over information and how it can lead to complacency, which seem to currently include Jersey Shore and Perez Hilton).  But information doesn't have to be overload, and I enjoy being able to share thoughts and life updates to all you lovely people even if we don't get to talk individually that often.  And if you have a blog, post a link in the comments!  I'd love to follow it.

 did I forget to mention our trip to Albany?

because we marched on the capitol then sat down to talk with legislators (ok, they sent their aids, but still)

did you know that Wall Stree profits this year were triple the record? but Gov Paterson wants to use federal stimulus money intended for job creation to fill budget gaps even though there's a tax on stock trades that gets immediately rebated and represents a $16 billion opportunity lost annually

oh, well I guess I'll have to get into that next time then