so... happy new year! :)

mmm... i just slathered on a cooling mask. if you're interested, it's the charmzone dasima mineral "pack" (korean word for mask), with seaweed (that's the dasima). ostensibly, it "makes your skin feel cool and refreshed like you were dipped in the ocean." hmm, hopefully not the sub-zero waters of the east coast, heh! brr~~

speaking of sub-zero... imagine the shock of boarding the plane in warm, sunny southern california, only to step off into 20 degree weather. and then i came home to find my apartment a chilly 12 degrees celsius (that's 53.6 degrees F -- curiously enough, my thermostat goes by C). i was freezing in bed... no matter how i deeply i cocooned under the comforter i couldn't manage to get or stay warm, and i was too lazy to get up and turn on the heat... besides, i have an odd aversion to central heating (just ask dave c., lol) so i just curled up with my gund bear and eventually fell asleep. (don't worry -- i've since gotten over my aversion and set my thermostat to 20 C... 68 F).

my first day back at work wasn't too bad... i got in at 10, because i'm still kinda sorta on west coast time (which partially explains why i'm up at 3:25 am EST) and couldn't get up early... but it's all good because i missed the traffic and half our team's still on vacation anyway, including my manager. :)

onto my current obsessions:
makeup. yes, again, but not to the extent i was before. i'm getting into swapping away the stuff i don't use as much, on makeupalley (aka MUA)... which reminds me, hana joined MUA the other day and sent me a message through the MUA system! yay! she's in korea right now so i told her about a few korean brands that i like, including laneige, kate (actually a japanese brand), and etude. :) it's fun to be girly sometimes....

okonomiyaki... yeah, i didn't know what it was either. look here for more info. it's a japanese seafood pancake, served with japanese mayo, bonito shavings, worcestershire-based sauce, and green seaweed powder. yum! it's not widely available in the US... i had it in a tiny hole-in-the-wall place in nyc with lori and kari. it really was a hole in the wall... there was barely enough room for two people in there. after we placed our order, we waited outside, peeking occasionally through the window to see if our order was ready. we ate outside too, crouching on the pavement, huddled around the food with our chopsticks. quite ghetto, hehe, but it only added to the experience. anyway, for some reason i have a gigantic craving for okonomiyaki now so i went hunting online for a recipe and subsequently a japanese grocery store from which to purchase the necessary ingredients. :) now if they only carried those uniball signos... hehe.

restoration hardware lap duvet. i came across this while christmas shopping with a couple of friends last month, was struck by how lovely it was, then sort of forgot about it until after christmas when i was browsing the store in old town pasadena and decided to look for the lap duvet. wouldn't you know it, they were completely sold out, and of course, that only fueled my yen for the duvet.... luckily they had one left at the tysons corner (no apostrophe on "tysons" -- strange, i know) location here in virginia, so i put it on hold. planning to pick it up this weekend... i can't wait to snuggle up with it on the futon!

simple pleasures...

...the essence of beauty in everyday life. :)

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