Category Archives: Things I Love Thursday

Missed last week’s Things I Love Thursday post, which makes this my first one of 2011!

So 11 things that I love and am happy for:

♥ I’m so glad I got to have my family together for over the winter break. I’m glad that they’re alive and well.

♥ One of my friends sent me a link to one of the most beautiful wedding cakes I’ve ever seen on the incredibly lovely Desserts for Breakfast blog. (Those orchids are made of sugar!)

♥ This same gorgeous friend also introduced me to Dalton Ghetti’s amazing artwork made on the tips of used pencils.

♥ Mango pudding is one of my favourite desserts at Chinese restaurants. As are egg tarts and dim sum in general. (Especially the dim sum that comes on push-carts!)

♥ I’m grateful to live in a place where I can often see the pale feather of the moon soaring high in cloudless blue skies, long before the sun has begun its evening descent.

♥ Meet-ups with old, high school friends are sometimes the best. It never ceases to amaze me how much some people can still care for one another over distances and time, and I’m humbled by what you give me.

♥ New notebook to journal in for the new year! It is black with a pattern of coloured peace symbols that really cheers me up just looking at it. Also, new posters for my room which quite delight me.

♥ I have a supervisor for my thesis, hurrah hurrah! Was quite worried I wouldn’t find one for this term and then have to do it next term, which would have thrown quite the spanner into the works. Discussions are going splendidly.

♥ UBC has some of the best events to look forward to throughout the year. Have you noticed? There was the SLC last week, UBC’s Got Talent tomorrow, and the annual Vagina Monologues will be playing next month. Students here rock!

♥ A couple of friends recently introduced me to McCormick’s cinnamon sugar blend. Who knows why I crave this like nothing else when ill, but I do, and am so thankful to have a bottle to myself. Sprinkle sprinkle pooouuur.

♥ Lastly, but certainly not least important, are the comments that you leave me. Thank you for letting me know when you like or can relate to something I’ve written enough to let me know. I always do this little inner happy dance when a post has done a little more for someone than pass the time. You make my day — sometimes even my week — and you ought to know how lovely you are in the simple things you do.

Much love and joy for the week!

These I have loved:

♥ how my parents still hold hands when we go out together;

♥ ‘The Great Lover’ by Rupert Brooke;

♥ receiving packages and love letters in the post;

♥ my penguin pillow pet (named Pengu), long yearned for and surprise gifted to me by a particularly generous friend;

♥ sunsets and sunrises;

♥ reading books that validate my existence like Daniel Pink’s A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future;

♥ TED talks like Tony Robbins’s on why we do what we do;

♥ crossing items off my Day Zero list; and

♥ this passionate collaboration between Sam Tsui and Christina Grimmie, produced by Kurt Hugo Schneider, covering Nelly’s ‘Just a Dream’:

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2RA0vsZXf8]

Most of all, time to think and time to feel. One word encompassing my thoughts and emotions. Can you guess what it is?

My life could not be filled with more peace and blessings than it is right now, and I can only wish the same for you:

May all of you be happy and well loved in the year to come.

Almost forgot to do my Thursday post because — hurray! I’m now done with this term — everything I’ve been putting off is now clamouring for my attention and I feel busier than when I’m in school.

Nevertheless, some wonderful things that have been happening include:

♥ going to my favourite French bistro with a friend on a Grooster coupon and sharing a divine three-course meal together;

♥ welcoming back long out-of-town friends;

♥ watching Tangled with a new friend and enjoying it even more than I thought I would;

♥ enjoying pina colada smoothies (at the moment I believe that Bread Garden > Orange Julius);

♥ brainstorming and going Christmas gift shopping;

♥ getting free cookies;

♥ looking forward to my parents’ visit this weekend; and,

♥ going to Hawai’i together with the family next week, the first time we’re all together for Christmas in eight years (!!).

So just to let you know that if you don’t see a Things I Love Thursday post next week, it’s because I’m busy soaking up the sun. Promise to have beautiful pictures up as soon as the trip is done. Love and joy!

If I fail, I try again, and again, and again. What matters is how we finish.
–Nick Vujicic

Things I Love Thursday is the delightful act of posting about the things you love every Thursday, as begun by Gala Darling. It’s a fun happiness booster I enjoy doing, and would be really glad to hear about the things you enjoy too!

♥ I have been in excellent humour ever since I thought that if exams are the worst thing I have to complain about, then life is pretty damn amazing.

♥ Jon Schmidt’s piano/cello arrangement of ‘Love Story Meets Viva La Vida’ is one of my best songs for hardcore studying.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfH2BY5pdLw]

What’s one of yours?

♥ My friend’s blog I recently discovered (Life, Love, and the Pursuit of Success: A Guide to Navigating Your 20s), offering short, sweet posts on relationship advice and tasty-sounding recipes. It also makes me laugh.

♥ The mandarin oranges my friend dropped off the other day are sweet and delicious!

♥ The Point Grill restaurant at Marine Drive, also known as my time-saver and occasional reward during exam period.

♥ The falling snow feature on my WordPress (click through to my blog to see!).

♥ The absolutely amazing community potluck held at the Musqueam reserve last Thursday night. I am so grateful to have been a part of the First Nations Language Program and have the opportunity to visit the reserve on so many occasions for learning the language of the Musqueam people. It was a funny, touching evening filled with laughter and food. Thank you for everything.

♥ The beautiful young cat I fell in love with on the way home from the reserve. It was a mutual love at first sight — I pet her, she rubbed herself around my legs and made me her property, followed me when we walked away, and stood on my feet so I couldn’t go anywhere or do anything but pet her more where I stood. Oh Kitty, I wish I could have taken you with me, but I don’t think your owner would have appreciated that. This post goes out to you.

♥ Lastly, but not least, Nick Vujicic is one of the people in this world I most admire. Check him out — I promise he will be worth the next four minutes of your time.

The days are long, but the years are short.
— Gretchen Rubin

The above quote comes from The Happiness Project, a blog I like because it was one of the first sites that got me thinking seriously about the nature and importance of happiness.

This quote sums up my sense of passing time. While in the thick of things, like my four more papers and three finals between now and next Friday, the end feels wretchedly far away. On the other hand, I could hardly believe that it’s Thursday already again, and I should be writing my Thursday post, let alone that it’s December and there are less than 30 days to a new year.

(This in turn triggers thoughts like ‘ohemgee, I’m in fourth year, ohemgee, I only have another year and a half before I really can’t drag out my degree any longer, ohemgee, time is flying by and I feel like I haven’t done half the things I wanted to do when I first came to university, omgomgomg’. But that’s another post for another time.)

In the meantime — Thursday!

♥ My best friend in this city is home from exchange. Although I’m really happy for her that she had such a great time abroad that Vancouver is currently underwhelming her, I am still selfishly glad to have her back!

♥ I made my first snowman late last Thursday night, after watching Jade in the Coal. He was a small, lumpy affair, but I also got to make snow angels! (Check another item off my to do list.)

♥ A pot of good quality honey makes for great honey and lemon water. This is my favourite precaution against sore throats at this time of year.

♥ My friend’s sister introduced me to HauteLook, an online retail store currently offering rain boots on sale at $20-30 (ending today at noon). None of this $100+ nonsense — hurray! I will soon have my first pair of wellies in over a decade!

♥ I love my fellow Speakeasy volunteers. They are some of the warmest, most humorous, easygoing people I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet. Often I intend to pass through the volunteer space, only to find myself still there hours later, immersed in the most random and interesting conversations. Finding my niche at UBC was one of my biggest concerns in first year; I’m glad to say I’ve now found it.

♥ I got a two-day extension on one of my papers. THANK YOU, KIND PROFESSOR!

♥ I watched Jade in the Coal at the Frederic Wood Theatre on campus last Thursday and meant to write a post saying what a good play it is, but you can have it in a bullet point: It’s about Chinese miners in 1900 Cumberland, BC, and the arrival of a Cantonese opera troupe. Having prepared myself to hate Cantonese opera based on my toddler experiences of it, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself enjoying it. I do recommend it and tickets are still on sale for performances until December 4 (student price is $15).

♥ Nickelback’s ‘If Today Was Your Last Day’ is one my favourite videos because I totally want to carry suspicious black bags and throw their colourful contents onto strangers too!

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCZCfOygt_w]