kooshiball

My birthday comparison.

2007-06-25T00:06:46Z

What you guys think about this birthday comparison....

During my 26th birthday

During my 27th birthday

During my 28th birthday.

What you guys think?? haha...

My 28th birthday.

2007-06-25T00:02:40Z

Are these pictures very similar??

2006-12-31T21:37:23Z

December 2005 in Chicago Downtown

December 2006 in Laguna Beach

10 current functions of Japanese Cellphone

2006-10-29T03:33:34Z

I had dinner with my friends last night and he told me that current functions of Japanese cellphone and functions made me very impressed. These are:

1. Of course, we can use this for the normal phone fuction
2. Camera function (of course)
3. Car Navigation
4. Microsoft office function
5. MP3 function (music)
6. TV function
7. Internet function
8. Shopping function

Up to this point, nobody surprise about the function but

9. banking function - can put the banking information so this serve same function as Debit card
10. Japanese train ticketing function - Most of Japanese automatic wickets have scanning part and if cellphone was scaned, automatic wicket's gate automatically open. Probably, this is linked to the banking function stated in #9.

Then, I asked a question regarding to the security because its gonna be huge problem if someone drop the phone since there are lots of functions and personal information. And especially, I am interested in the situation when someone else other than self use the phone to buy something. And my friend said that most of the store has identity detector by using one's finger print. I was so impressed and thought that cellphone technology is so so so advanced in Japan.

Diet Competition result

2006-10-24T05:58:23Z

Today is Oct 23rd. Yes, today is the final weigh in for my company's diet competition. Result is................................. I am the biggest loser!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As a result, I got $445 as a prize and I lost total of 22LBs (I lost 11.5%). I am pretty satisfied that I could lose my weight as well as receive prize.
Next step for me will be to build the muscle. I will spend more time for building muscle from tomorrow!!

My body before the competition

My body as of today

House Warming Party

2006-10-22T18:12:49Z

We had our house belated warming party yesterday. Supposedly, 8 ppl are scheduled to come here but 3 ppl (Jonathan and other 2) could not make it because one of them who has a car suddenly had to work at night (thats mean rest of 2 ppl could not come also). So, we prepared foods and drinks for 10 ppl but lots of them became left over (Amouth we can have a same party again today).

We did Cranium and drinking games and we drink drink until late at night. This is our first house warming barbeque party. Overall, it was quite sucessful. Ppl enjoyed and we had fun too!!! In the future, we want and will have more barbeque party!!!

This is our new barbeque grill!!!!

I am head chef in the Kooshi's barbeque grill!! hahaha

My parents visit

2006-10-08T02:21:07Z

My mum, grandma, and brother visited my place from September 28th to October 3rd. I took 4 days off during their visits. We had great fun (especially, my mum's food so good!!! I have not eaten for almost 3 years). Basically, below are what we did.

September 28th: They arrived at LAX and relax for this day.

September 29th: Desert Hill outlet mall

September 30th: Original Pancake house for brunch
Laguna Beach
South Coast Plaza (My brother bought gift for his gf in LV)

October 1st: Santa Monica beach and street

October 2nd: Marina Del Rey and my company

October 3rd: Last day: They left from LAX at noon.

Because they stayed in my place for only 5 days, we could not go many places. I hope that they can stay in here bit longer days so that I can take them to go more places.

Diet Competition

2006-08-24T03:04:44Z

Company began something called "Diet Competition" from yesterday. Basically, the person who lose the weight the most after 2 month later will win the competition. And participants chipped in $25 each and winner will receive the total amount of money chipped in by all participants. There are 9 participants including myself so winning prize will be $225.

But the thing is that I have been working out in the gym (Yes I am now working out in the gym!!!) for almost 3 weeks now. So it is bit disadvantageous for me because I already lost some weight before the competition began. But, I think this is more like motivating myself to lose more weight rather than trying to get the winning prize. Anyway, I will try my best to lose weight and hopefully, I can get the prize as well :)

Gym membership

2006-07-25T06:54:32Z

Well... I have not updated this journal for a long long time. I finally moved to new place called West Covina (40 to 45 min Northwest from Irvine).

Nowadays, I realized that I have gained so much weight. I said myself like "I cannot let my body like this anymore". So I have been checking out the gym on the internet for past few days. One day, I found the gym in which located very near from our new apt (only 3 min away from my apt). I checked other gym but all gyms are quite far away from my apt. Plus, the gym I found in near my apt opens 24 hours so I can go there anytime.

So, Cindy and I went to see the gym after work (actually, I just came back from that gym). We saw the training facility and we love it (In that gym, there is lots of weight machine, cadio machine, swimming pool, sauna, steam room, and even free classes everyday. We talked with the gym person about various choices. We chose the month by month based gym membership. With that membership, I can go to any location. I added the 5 free man-to-man training with instructor because I just dont know where to start. And I think monthly payment is quite reasonable and not so much upfront fee to pay. Today is too late so we didnt work out today but I will go to the gym from tomorrow for sure!!! Work out start from tomorrow!!!!

Las Vegas here I go!

2006-05-27T12:24:51Z

Finally time has come.... Las Vegas here I go!!! :)

I cannot believe it

2006-05-20T16:54:10Z

I just heard from Cindy that Sandy cannot go to the brunch with her because she is playing game (only two of them). They promised about going to the brunch in advance but still rip this promise because of the GAME. I just cannot believe how she behaves like that and how she does not have any commonsense.

The thing I hate about

2006-04-11T04:25:53Z

I totally hate the situation when ppl refuse to speak common language. I have experienced this a lot nowadays (others speaking chinese in entire time even if I am in the conversation so I don't understand at all). At least, if I am in the same situation (like there is only one friend from other country among Japanese ppl), I will at least talk to him or her in English sometimes to let him or her understand or participate the conversation. But, some of them obviously do not have much common sense for that. I really hate it.

Funny conversation at work

2006-04-09T17:18:33Z

There is quite funny conversation at work 2 weeks ago (I just remembered and it quite funny to me). There is plant employee. His name is Jesus. I was looking for him but I didn't know who his he because I still could not remember all ppl's name from plant. But I do know that he is operating in paticular machine in one section. So I went up there and this convesation was something like this:

Me: Excuse me
worker: what?
Me: are you Jesus?
worker: I am not.
Me: so where is Jesus? He is the machine opeartor for this machine.
worker: oh that is him over there.

After talking with him, I went back to the office and I found out that his name's accent is different (accent is like hesus). I was so embarassed.

Laguna Beach

2006-03-06T02:18:20Z

This weekend

2006-03-05T05:42:44Z

Today, we went to the mall in the Beverly hills called Beverly center. I thought that mall in the beverly hills so its gonna be very big and very happening place but actually it is not so much. Plus, we had to pay parking fee ($1). I think it is quite okay.

Before going there, we went to other outside mall called Irvine spectrum. We had lunch there but guess what we ate?? We actually had mexican food. The thing is that we could not really tell what kind of restaurant it was and Cindy and I were talking like that restaurant looks quite good so we can have lunch there. But this restaurant was mexican food restaurant!!!! I had tacos and Cindy had fajita. It was quite good but I dont think I will go back to the restaurant.

After that, we headed to Beverly Center. In the first floor, we saw the restaurant which we have gone before: Grand Lux Cafe!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We wanted to go there but we had mexican restaurant during lunch already so we did not feel like to go there to eat at dinner. Instead, we went to Japanese ramen restaurant in little tokyo. It was quite good. I am gonna continue to explore the good place to eat in LA area!!!!

Probably, we will go to our favorite Laguna beach for breakfast or brunch tomorrow. I will take pics of restaurant and beach and put the pictures in the journal.

Beverly Center in Beverly hills!!!!

Grand Lux Cafe in LA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I remembered when I had dinner at Grand Lux Cafe in Chicago with Tim, Teri and Natalia.

Mexican Restaurant in Irvine Spectrum

CA roadtrip: final day

2006-02-07T07:08:27Z

This day was the final day of my roadtrip. Today was relatively easy trip since I reached to Fragstaff yesterday (still I had to drive more than half day but.....)

Where I go: Fragstaff AZ to Irvine CA

Passing city: no particular big city

Distance: approx 500 miles

How long: 8:00AM to 3:30PM (8 and half hr. passed the pacific time zone)

About this day:
I felt very excited at this date because I know that I will arrive at final destination: Irvine CA. I saw several stiff mountain while i was driving in AZ. This scenary did not change even when I entered to state of CA for a while. On the way to CA, I saw the sign saying that grand canyon is this way. I wanted to visit the grand canyon because I have never been there before. However, I thought 1st priority was reaching my final destination so I decided not to go there (plus I think I can go there anytime I want from now on). For both CA and AZ, inside of the car was very very hot because strong sun light from outside. This thing never happened in Midwest. At that time, I really felt that I am reaching to CA soon. As I got closer to final destination, there were more cars in the highway. And one more thing I realized when I was driving in CA was that there are lots of palm trees. If I saw these palm trees, I can really feel that I am in CA.

On Feb 3rd at 3:30PM, I finally arrive at final destination: Irvine CA. While I was looking outside and inside of apartment, I feel so exicted to spend new life in this place. I am so looking forward to explore my brand new time in this place.

Flagstaff AZ in the morning

Stiff mountains

Palm trees!!!!!

stiff mountains again!!!

border between AZ and CA

CA roadtrip: 2nd day

2006-02-07T06:44:37Z

I think this 2nd day was the hardest day for me. Of course, I also enjoyed driving too!!!!!

Where I go: Chandler OK to Fragstaff AZ

Pass through: OK City OK、Amarillo TX, Albuquerque NM

Distance: Approx 930 miles

How long: 14 hrs (from 7:30AM to 8:30PM and I gained 1 hr because of crossing to mountain time zone)

About this day:
As I said on the top, this date was the hardest day because I drove most intencely for both distance and hour.
When I was driving in this date, I realized something: as I was crossing from one state to another state, formation of land also changed. When I was driving in OK, I was driving along with plain field in most of time. But as I crossed from OK to TX, I was driving along with desert. Especially most of the land I was driving in TX was the desert area. After driving several hrs in NM, there were deserted area with some creep and caves. When I saw this, I felt "nature is very powerful!!!" . Finally, when I entered the Arizona state, there were some forest with rock mountain with caves (although I could not see that scenary because of after the sunset)

When I entered the state of Arizona, I was so so tired. But, I continued to drive till original destination I decided: Fragstaff (it is 150 miles away from border of Arizona and NM). After arrving at Fragstaff, I was so tired that I could not even feel I was hungry (I ate arbys in the end but.....). I found the Days Inn in this town so I stayed there for one night.

border between TX and OK

Welcome to NM!!

driving between the creeps!!

Town called vega TX. There were only 936 ppl living in this town!!!

CA roadtrip: 1st day

2006-02-07T06:24:33Z

hooo... I finally arrived at Irvine CA. Although I arrived at this place on last friday, I could not update my journal because of no internet connection on my computer. But I do now. I finally can update my roadtrip. Anyway, I am so so so tired for driving for these two days but it is very exciting and productive trip. I will update about this roadtrip based on day by day.

Where I go: Chicago (my previous company) to Chandler OK

Pass through: Springfield IL, St. Louis MO, and Tulsa OK

Distance: approx 780 miles

How many hrs: 12 hour (from 8:30AM to 8:30PM)

About this day:
Because I had to go to my previous company to greet people in the morning, I departed from Chicago bit late. There were quite lots of traffic till I got out of Chicago area but after that, there were almost no cars at all. First destination when I left from Nagano is St Louis. Distance was approx 350 miles. It was quite long and hard distance since I had not driven such a long distance for a long long time but I got used to drive long distance as I drove (of course, there were almost nothing on the way to St Louis). I had lunch from McDonald after arriving at St Louis. When I got out of the car, weather was already much warmer than Chicago. I kept driving my car after the lunch except when I put the gas at gas station. After passing Tulsa OK (around 8pm), I felt very very tired and I decided wherever there were hotels in the exit, I will take that exit. Foutunately, I could find the Econolodge in small town called Chandler and I spent a night in this town.

This is on the way to St Louis. There are nothing around.

St Louis

St Louis2

Econolodge. Chandler OK

OK city here I come!!!

Arrive at Irvine CA

2006-02-04T03:28:12Z

I finally arrived at my final destination: Irvine CA. I arrive at this place around 3:30pm today. It took me 2 and half day to get here. Oh man. I am so so so tired. I will update about this roadtrip later but I just want to say that I finally arrived!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My starting date in the new company

2006-01-24T04:57:39Z

I talked with human resource in the new company about my starting date. As I suggested him, my starting date will be Feb 13th. There are enough time for me to travel from Chicago to new location and prepare for my new life in CA. I plan to take lots of pictures on the way to CA (of course, I will post pictures in my livejournal hehe). And I need to enjoy my precious free time before I begin to work.

I also asked him about my work attire. He told me that I need to wear the business professional attire. I have never worn business professional attire except during interview. Now, I will need to wear that every day (of course, I can take out the tie once I get used to work in the company but still....). when I was thinking to study in the US, I had one dream that I wear the business professional attire and I am doing business with someone from different country. It finally came true but I feel bit worry that I have to wear this every day because I am so confortable to wear the work uniform already (I need to think which clothes should I wear every day if there is no uniform). Oh well.... I hope I will eventually be able to get used to wear these clothes.

After arriving at CA, I need to do lots of things, such as changing driver's licence, state registration for my car, BUYING NEW WORK ATTIRE. I have to make list of what to do when I go over there.

Indian from my apt

2006-01-23T02:02:38Z

I am so angry about one indian who tried to buy the computer desk today. He called me that he is interested in buying computer desk. Then he came to my apartment like few min later. He looked at the desk and he try to get discount (from $30 to $20). I said okay. He said to me that he will ask some friends to pick the computer table together later today. I said to him that I will prepare to give the desk to you (like bring computer down from desk etc). After prepare to sell the computer table, I went down to the laundry room to pick up my clothes. I saw that indian guy so I asked him my computer table is ready so you can pick it up anytime. Then he said the word that I dont expect. He said to me that "I wont take it anymore" because he talked his wife and this desk is too big (If I dont meet him in the laundry room, he would not tell me??). At that time, I became so angry and told him that "if you are not sure that you will buy the computer table, then you could have said to me that you dont want it before I prepare to sell it and dont call me in the first place". I used my precious time for that savage. Oh well, I really dont want to deal with those indian ppl in my apartment.

Result of Judgement day

2006-01-19T03:33:30Z

Well... I went to the company early today to tell Goro that I will quit the job. I was so so so nervous till in this morning. After telling him about it, it was not so bad after all. He took it pretty well and he even said "this is your life so you can do whatever you want with it. If there is better life, you should take it". Even better, he said he will give me bonus. I am so so so happy now...

After the coversation with Goro, we met agreement that I will work in Nagano till Feb 1st. And I will only go to the office for a little bit to say thank you and good bye in the company on Feb 1st so practically, I will work till January 31st. I am planning to leave from Chicago as soon as I am done with greeting on Feb 1st.

Anyway, I glad that it is over. And now, I will really think about my life in CA.

Judgement day: my resignation

2006-01-18T11:44:50Z

Now is 5:40AM. I could not sleep really well last night. In fact, I woke up so early like this time. I am very nervous now.... But at the same time, if I tell my employer about my resignation, I can finally become California resident. I will post about exactly what happen later today. Anyway, everyone, wish me good luck!!!

Moving

2006-01-16T01:04:26Z

I am quite busy for the moving right now. There were people who wanted to buy my moving items. I took care of them today and yesterday. They took variety of stuffs, such as TV, 2 couches, even clockpot. Now, there are almost no funititure at all in the lving room except foldable couch which I brought from small bedroom. Now, I really feel that I am going to move to CA. I am excited to go to CA but also bit sad to leave this place too.

one corner of living room where dinning table is used to be located

TV is also gone!!!!

Both couches are gone too....

Moving Sale

2005-12-19T05:10:12Z

I made the lists of items I want to sell in order to move. I listed the big items, such as TV, Couch, TV stand etc etc. Then I just put the ads in my apts' lobby and near the gym. After few hr, I got one phone call from resident (he seems to be indian). He was asking me if couchs are still available. I was quite surprised because couch is the last thing I thought I can sell. Anyway, he will come to my apt to see the item tomorrow night at 6:30pm. I hope that I can sell some of my items....