i love funerals

Wham, bam, the new year is here. 2006 came in with not so much a bang, but a soft clap. It was very chill at Tom's in Stanford. I am never going to try to plan New Year's again though. I realize that I am not one for the excessive nature of New Year's and never will be. Although, jokingly enough, my New Year's resolution was to drink more. :-P

Vacation in Erie came and went with a lot of stuff going on. I met my two cousins, Vee (3) and Trung (10). My uncle will always call out "Vee Bui!" and I keep thinking that is me. She is very cute and sickenly talkative and heavily favored, since she is the youngest. I obviously love her, but I admit I do try to show a lot of attention to the older one. It's tough being the oldest! Anyways, they were great and I tried my best to spoil them with the movies, games, and lots of loving attention. Perhaps the funniest memories will be 1. Vee sticking a Battleship peg up her nose and not telling us about it until it hurt real bad and 2. Trung crying her eyes out because she thought she wouldn't get to say good bye to me. So cute. Vee loved my new Colts Santa hat. Aren't they adorable?


Unfortunately, Becky's grandma, Barbara McCormick died over the holidays. I've known her since I was 13 or 14 as well, so it was sad. But it was her time and she was suffering. I spent much of my vacation (after the little cousins left) with my second family, the Van Cleves. And you'd think that it wasn't fun, but really, I enjoyed the funeral festivites. I am just like my mother, who loves funerals. Although it was sad, funerals bring together family you wouldn't see otherwise, and you get to celebrate a great person. The only time funerals stink are the ones that involve accidental and shocking deaths. This was not one of them. I got to meet Uncle Clem, Cousin Scott (who is hot :-P), told Steve Irvin's dad that I used to have the hugest crush on Steve in 8th grade (verbal vomit is such a problem with me), saw several scary old BSS teachers and Sister Mary Alice (aggh!), and just schmooze with the best adoptive family around. Plus Sam visited from Vegas and it was great to see the alpha male of the cousins. He has shot up to a healthy 6ft 2in and might just grow up to be the most normal out of everyone, even though we tried our hardest to screw him up. :-) Here's a photo of us, going crazy with Becky's new G5.


It was great catching up with Ben. Back from Africa and as crazy as ever. Very ethnic! I also got to see Hanni, my biatch, who was as biatchy as ever. :-P But that's Hanni and I still love her. I'll make her suffer in March, though. Tom was Tom with an amazing apartment in Stamford. I can see why it costs $1,000 a month! Mom was mom, with her wonderful love and food. I've started telling her "I love you Mom!" in English and she will return with a gargled "... you too." in broken English. It's so cute. And Patton got me tons of Colts paraphenalia, so I can be incredibly obnoxious. And best of all, I got to see Becky, perhaps my female platonic soulmate. Here are a few awesome photos of us. This is us being thugs:

And now us being incredibly snarky and sneaky:


It was hard to leave Erie. Whenever I leave, I get a heavy feeling in my heart. But I push on because I know being in Erie too long would make me crazy and unhappy. I'd look like this:

Still, I can't help but miss my family and friends. I love you all.

Crazy new idea: Moving to California! I would do it if I won the lottery. I'd look like this if I did: