Jon and I went to Nathan's before Fellowship started so they could get some worship practice in. Nathan definitely appreciated my gift of ginger ice cream, saying he'd been craving it for a long time. After some time, we took his mom's silver Cadillac to pick up Jen and Danielle so that he wouldn't have to drive illegally should it come up. Nathan likes his car better, but Jon loved the heated seats! Jon called Danielle to tell her that we were nearby, but we couldn't find any parking. "You know what your mom always told you about not jumping into strangers' cars that have the door open? Disregard that!" Jon also did an imitation of an old lady, which led to Danielle asking him whether he was sick! *laugh* Nathan also kinda burned Danielle by remarking that she looked ready for motherhood... now he has to buy her dinner! (he definitely got in trouble from Citrus, heh) Jen was also telling us that her computer had problems, so Nathan suggested a movie / computer reformat night sometime this week to take care of the problem. Eric and Citrus were suggested as people who would know about that kind of thing... I hope things go well with that!
When we got to church, I discovered that my Saturday ride wouldn't be going tomorrow because of a wedding.. oh well. I went to the Pho place to have something to eat; Silvester saw me there, and joined me. We talked about how my sister got interested in forensics / chemistry in the first place. He didn't want to know the exact details (which I couldn't provide), and hopes that he won't need her services after he dies! Some of that can be pretty gross, for sure! Later, we had a very challenging speaker covering the hunger for God that places like China / India / Vietnam have. I can't imagine going to Bible school in caves, not bathing, and being tortured regularly by the police! They have such a hunger there in those countries, while we Westerners just take it for granted or have too many distractions to properly devote our time to religion! As I said later to Nathan, I'd like to commit my life to God. But I also know that if I can't make a full commitment (whatever that means for me), I should just take the time to think things through. I should change my life accordingly, even with all these creature comforts. That was a very thought-provoking message, at any rate!
I told Randal, Sheena, Connie, Melia, Emily, Phil, Jason, Janette, and others about my cruise. (I also told Phil and Randal about
The Assassin's Cloak... very interesting diary snippets from people's lives!) Helen K. told me that she was three months pregnant... more babies! It'll be funny if her kid's born on her due date / my brother's birthday (Nov. 25), since her best friend Lauren's son Matthew was born on my sister's birthday. (Feb. 16) That's quite the quirky coincidence! If Helen's kid is born on Jon's birthday, we joked that the baby would HAVE to be named after him! (it doesn't matter if it's a boy or girl :P) She and her husband Danny can't agree on names yet, since she doesn't like the names he does and vice versa. Sophia said that she already had a name picked out for her baby: Olivia. (yes, she knows it's going to be a girl) Her husband John likes his music on loud, and people were wondering if it would affect the baby. I told them about this person I know who likes to have HIS music on extremely loud, but that's semi-partially to muffle the noise of six to eight people tromping around upstairs! Good thing John and Sophia don't have that problem, haha!
Dianne told me, Connie, and Randal about her more-or-less spontaneous decision to go to Europe with a few friends in July and August. They plan to go to France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the Czech Republic, and a lot of other places. As Randal said, she's not going EVERYWHERE. No Luxembourg, Belarus (best known for upsetting Sweden at the 2002 Winter Olympics), Poland, or other places! Sounds like a great fun trip, nevertheless! I tried some green apple sparkling water, and asked Eric about his week. He said it had been all right, and asked if I'd met anyone interesting online: of course I told him about the board games night on Tuesday! We ate a lot of refreshments, but still went out to eat. Apparently, there's a
Revenge of the Sith night on Monday / an Ultimate game on Sunday. I have no idea what I'll do on Sunday, but odds are that I might just follow my brother around. :P Good thing that I don't mind that TOO much: Connie even marvelled at how relaxed I was just doing whatever he did. It's true that I could have gone home with Eric, but I chose to hang out with Jon and Nathan instead. Nathan was checking his cell phone to see if his mom had called him to pick her up from the airport yet.. no calls.
Erin, Jessica, Karen Grace, Ryan, Derek, and others decided to eat at the Congee Noodle House. I definitely remembered the time that I ate a bowl of spicy mini-peppers at a family lunch, freaking out my Hong Kong cousins and uncle! There was the time that Sean didn't want to order rice there because then rice would be coming out of his butt! (we had to translate
faan for Eric, and jokingly suggested he get liver and kidney congee!)
Then there was the time that Nathan, Jon, Sean, Adela, and I went to the restaurant after Fellowship in January 2003. What to say about Sean? Well, he's usually sort of dorky, and says things the rest of us wouldn't dare to say. During the course of a late-night dinner / snack, we learned (among other things) that:
* he doesn't know much Chinese (asking for "one lot tea" instead of "one cup of tea") [then he wanted to ask for a plate of tea, a cup of soya sauce chicken, etc.]
* he wants "a hot mama" who will bear him thirty children
* more specifically, the "hot mama" in question will need to bear him these thirty children in ten years
* then, when we told him that it was impossible to bear these hypothetical children all in ten years (triplets every year? we think not), he came up with this gem: "Well, my sperm is very powerful, but I don't want to exhaust the system of the ovaries..."
* since he's lactose-intolerant, Adela (his then-girlfriend) should "lay off all the cheese, cheddar, and mozzarella" in her romance talk to him
* he's the one embodiment of true love (yeah, right!)
Mind you, this all comes from the guy who once cleared an entire table at the Cactus Club with his proclamation of:
"This Caesar salad's so good, I'm having an orgasm!" He tried denying most of what he said (
"I wasn't talking about ovaries, I was talking about poetry!"), but we told Adela what really happened when she got back from the washroom. Very hilarious time out... hahahaha!
On the way there, Nathan decided to see who had called him in the middle of the message. It turned out to be his friend Andrew asking about what toner / facewash was good. Jon and I laughed at that, and made fun of him for asking about girl products. One of his friends is so frustrated that he'll switch teams if he doesn't get a girlfriend in a year or so! We asked jokingly if Andrew was still a man, or just gay. That was a funny conversation, since he had no idea who was in the car with Nathan!
Jon saw his friends Jackie and Dave there, so talked to them instead. That was okay, though... Erin said she'd invite herself over to the townhouse and eat the food that Mom made us if we weren't going to! I'll be home more than Jon, but I won't cook much. We talked about work, cooking, church, and pharmacy work. (Choice and true quote from Nathan:
"I'll become a good father and husband... wait, that's not the Biblical way! I'll get married first and be a husband BEFORE fatherhood!") Emily won't get here till Wednesday, which is when "Reformat Jen's Computer and Watch Chinese Movies Night" is tentatively planned. She hasn't contacted either me or Jon, even though Steph gave her our contact info... we figure the ball's in her court if she needs a ride from the airport or something! She'll stay with me... but I won't have time to get her any spare keys... I *knew* I should have done this a LONG time ago. Aiya.
After eating, we went to Shoppers since Nathan wanted to buy some toner. Jon and I didn't mind going along for the ride, haha. Outside the store, we saw a man who just wanted food: it was refreshing that he didn't want money at all! ("ONLY FOOD... HAPPY TO EXPLAIN") Nathan has a "food, not money" philosophy when it comes to helping those less fortunate: he has a can of Chunky Soup in the backseat of his car in case he sees someone who's in need, or they approach him. That plan usually works, since that's what most of them want. If not, then we know what they REALLY wanted. We decided to buy the dude some iced tea, nutrigrain granola bars, and some candy. Malcolm was very appreciative, and explained that he'd been in a motorcycle accident last week which broke his hand in two places. "Bless you three... I'll remember you, and pay it forward!"
After that, we went to Nathan's again to watch
The Life Aquatic and Chinese TV shows. It's been a challenging, yet fruitful day.
P.S.
The theme music for The Life Aquatic rocks!Labels: andrew, citrus, computer, connie, danny, derek, dianne, emily, grace, helen, ice cream, india, jackie, jason, jen, jessica, maxed-out tags limit, ryan, sheena, triplets