Two days ago at the mall with my little girl, Ooseung.

“Ughh, now we need to buy a Valentines Day card for ummah.”

“Why don’t we MAKE one, appah.”

“Now that is a good idea.  We’re done here.  Let’s go.”

So, each of us drew a picture showing our love.  Happy Free Valentine’s Card Day.

That’s really all I have to say in this entry.

Oh, and that Amy said she bought me a card a month ago, but couldn’t find it this morning.  It had two bulldogs on it or something.  You don’t need a card to show your love — the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups she got me were better.

Ooseung drew the left half, above.  Note the shrimp chips (top) and pizza rolls (bottom).   I will venture that Sun Su’s drawing was slightly inspired by our recent rewatching of the Dungeons & Dragons episode with Lolth, Queen of Spiders, in it.

That’s Ooseung’s rendition of me, happily watching TV alone, sipping an Icee.

“There’s this water cooler in the office that no one ever fills up,” Amy started telling me.

“So I came up with an idea for a contest.  People mark on a sheet when they fill it up and at the end of the month, the winner gets a prize.”

“That’s a good idea.  What kind of prize?” I asked.

“I don’t know.  A pack of gum or something.”

“Who wants to do that for gum?”

“That’s not the point.  So I find out that Seymour has been filling up the water cooler when there’s still a quarter of a tank left – just so he can fill it up before anyone else!”

“It’s almost empty, what’s the big deal?”

“It’s a big deal because he’s cheating on my contest and wasting water!”

“Whatever.”

“So the next time I heard him fill the cooler, I caught him.  I told him SEYMOUR YOU ARE BANNED FROM MY CONTEST!  Loud enough for the whole office to hear.”

(Everything Amy says is loud enough for the whole office to hear.)

“That must have been pretty loud.  Normally I can hear you from down the hall anyways.”

“That’s what he gets.”

“So how’s the contest been going since?”

“No one is doing it but me now.”

AMY:  “Babe, listen to what happened at work today, you’ll like this.”

ME:  “Uh oh, what?”

AMY:  “So I was seeing this old lady in the clinic with the doc and she was going on about how she has trouble with certain foods.  Then she says, ‘But I like Chinese food in small amounts,’ and looks at me.”

ME:  “Uh huh.”

AMY:  “So after the doc leaves, she says to me, ‘I didn’t say that I like Chinese food just because you’re here but I really can’t eat much of it.’  I told her that’s okay.”

ME:   “Maybe she thought you’d tell on her.  I didn’t realize I was married to the Ambassador to China.”

AMY:  “Me neither.”

ME:  “You should be used to it by now, ambassador.”

AMY:  “I’m not.”

But I get it.  Innocent old lady from an older world where the first Asians in this country en masse all seemed to be the Chinese.  Asian wasn’t even a household word then.  Oriental was.  I can see how it’s still annoying to Amy though.  Not being seen as an individual, but rather as a part of a collective group that you have nothing in common with other than some superficial features.  And that’s not even including whatever stereotypes are there.  It’s just better not to guess and assume the person is as unique as you are.

Still, it’s weird.  Something about the culture.  Even our three-quarter Corean kids with a large exposure to things Corean have looked at unfamiliar Asian images and asked if it was Chinese first.  Maybe because we go to the Chinese store a lot.  Shrug.  I don’t think the USA is any more racist than other countries.  We’re just more aware of it and not afraid to criticize ourselves in the open as a country.  I didn’t mean for this to be all patriotic, especially five days after Independence Day has passed, but it is nice to have that kind of freedom.

As for me, I’ve gotten used to being mistaken as Jewish.  Shalom!

Some late Fourth of July pictures below.  And again, thanks for the fireworks, China.

At work.

ME (on phone):  “Hey, did you page me?”

AMY:  “Yeah.  When I was walking into the clinic this morning, I saw — hehehe — I saw this young guy, with a big black eye.”

ME:  “Uh huh….”

AMY:  “And he was going to the Pain Clinic.  HAHAHOOHOOHEHE!”

ME:  “… And then what?”

AMY:  “That’s it.  Heheheh!”

ME:  “That’s it?  Really?”

AMY:  “Yeah.  It must have REALLY hurt (sarcasm), hahaha!”

ME:  “Bwahaha!  I can’t believe you’re laughing at that.  Haha, you’re crazy.”

AMY:  “Hehehee!  Okay, I have to go.  I just wanted to tell you that, heh!”

ME:  “Alright.”

I’m married to one mean S.O.B., I tell you.

-

I was mostly laughing because Amy found it so inexplicably hilarious.  But it became funnier the more I thought about it and deconstructed it.

1) Amy is an oncology nurse and sees a lot of people in serious cancer pain.  A young man with a black eye isn’t going to impress her sympathies.

2) The Pain Clinic is actually the chronic pain clinic – for people with unrelenting bony pain or back pain or cancer pain.  It’s not for boo-boos or shiners.

3) Sometimes we just really need to laugh together, especially in this line of work.

4) I guess I just like ‘em a little bit cruel.

-

Oh and check this out.  Hello Kitty underwear for men.

Surprisingly, Amy says, “Hell no.”

People who meet my wife, Amy, often say she has a New York accent.  She doesn’t sound like Joe Pesci.  I think they mean that she can be very in-ya-face with less concern for tact than most midwesterners.  What do you think?

AMY:  “Hey, are you coming out with the rest of the office for some drinks?”

NON-DESCRIPT OFFICE LADY:  “Nah.  I’ve kind of got some things to do.”

AMY:  “Oh, alright.  At least it’s not because of religious reasons or something like that, HAHAHEE!” (punches lady in the arm)

NDOL:  “Actually, it is something like that.”

AMY:  “Oh…. *snicker*”

NDOL:   “You know, there are other ways of having fun besides alcohol.”

AMY:  “Not when I’ve got someone to watch the kids.”

Amy used to drink more before we started going out.

This is just fair warning in case we ever meet someone out there.