|
SubscriptionsSites I Read
|
|
|
|
| 2011 has been a wonderful year filled with so many random adventures and travels almost on a monthly basis. It hasn't been easy on my bank account, but it has definitely filled my heart and soul with great memories with awesome friends. 2011 was also filled with engagement, wedding, and baby news! Congratulations to all of my friends who got married/engaged in 2011!! 
There were definitely low moments that makes me question my life and judgements of people, but I'm over that and I'm thankful to have friends and family who remind me that no matter what I choose to do with my life, you're always there to pick me up and make me feel all better. The last few weeks have been especially rough and stressful, but the year is ending and a new year will soon begin.
Cheers to a (mostly) wonderful year! 
2011 Goals accomplished:
1. Release sky lanterns
2. Viet Nam to visit family / S. Korea (Aug 26 - Sept 11)
3. Make-A-Wish – completed 1st wish (6/13)
4. Gondola ride in Newport Beach
5. Minneapolis, MN (June 9-12)
6. NYC (Dec 9-13)
7. Ultra Music Festival – Miami, FL (3/23-3/28)
8. Successful 30th Annual Tet Festival (2/4-2/6)
9. Cancun (5/28 – 5/31)
10. Supermoon viewing (random adventures)
11. Party until the sun comes up (Space in Miami – 7:30am)
12. Girls’ trip to SF (April 2-3)
13. Temecula's Wine & Balloon Festival (June 2-4)
14. San Francisco again (2/19 – 2/21, 7/2 – 7/4)
15. Glendale, AZ (7/15 – 7/17)
16. Concerts:
Prince at LA Forum (4/21)
Kylie Minogue & Kaskade at Hollywood Bowl (5/20)
Looking forward to starting another wonderful new year filled with adventures! Below are some notes of things I want to do in 2012 - come join me. 
2012 Goals:
1. Europe – Ibiza, Paris, London, Rome, etc.
2. Chicago, IL
3. SF/Sonoma
4. NYC – gonna make this my annual trip
5. Be a homeowner
6. More “me” time
7. Hawaii
8. Go strawberry picking
9. Sky dive (if I end up going to Hawaii)
10. Camping at the Grand Canyon
11. Learn how to play golf
12. Hot air balloon ride
13. Save more $$$
14. Salt Lake City, UT – LNA concert (booked 1/11 – 1/14)
15. Portland, OR
16. Learn Chinese
17. Watch the peak of a meteor shower | | |
| The real story of Dec 25, Christmas, Santa Claus, and awesome marketing. =) Below is an article I got from Bloomberg.
Smart Marketing Put Dec. 25 on the Calendar: John Steele Gordon
2011-12-21 00:00:10.0 GMT
By John Steele Gordon
Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) -- This Christmas, whether you
celebrate the arrival of Santa Claus, the birth of Jesus Christ
or the chance to eat Chinese food and see any movie you want,
spare a thought for Pope Liberius. He’s the man responsible for
setting its date as Dec. 25.
And his probable reasons for doing so should give pause to
the holiday’s most devout champions and its shrillest critics.
Ever wonder why some Christian holidays, such as Easter,
Ash Wednesday and Ascension Day, are “movable feasts,” changing
around the calendar from year to year, while others, such as
Christmas and Epiphany, do not?
The reason is that the movable feasts are much older,
celebrated from the earliest days of the church. They were based
loosely on the lunar Hebrew calendar. Passover is celebrated on
the day of the first full moon of spring, and the Last Supper
was a Seder. So early Christians marked Good Friday (the day of
the crucifixion) and Easter (the Resurrection) soon after
Passover. (In 325 A.D., Easter was fixed on the first Sunday
after the first full moon of spring.)
Christmas was only added to the Christian calendar in the
fourth century, and, frankly, it was added as a marketing ploy.
We don’t know the actual date of the birth of Jesus, but
St. Luke (one of the two Gospel writers who mention the
nativity) noted that at the time the “shepherds were abiding in
the field and keeping watch over their flocks by night.” That
would imply a date in the spring or summer, when the herds were
up in the hills, not in the winter, when the animals were kept
in corrals.
Saturnalia’s Role
So why did Pope Liberius decide in 354 to celebrate
Christmas on Dec. 25? Well, in the absence of a fourth-century
tell-all by one of Bob Woodward’s forerunners, we can’t really
be sure. But we do know two things: First, when Liberius took
office, the church was beset by a heresy known as Arianism,
which taught that Jesus Christ was not truly divine but rather a
created being. Second, Dec. 25 fell right at the end of the
Saturnalia, the ancient Roman solstice festival, celebrated from
Dec. 17 to Dec. 24. In the fourth century, after the Emperor
Constantine (who ruled from 306 to 337) converted to
Christianity, the new religion spread very rapidly. But the
pagan Saturnalia was a very popular festival. It was marked with
parties, gift-giving, decorating the houses with evergreens
(sound familiar?), and a lot of drinking and sex.
By setting the date of Christmas as Dec. 25, Pope Liberius
was both affirming the divine birth of Christ against heretics
and telling would-be Christians that, in effect, “you can
convert to Christianity and still enjoy the Saturnalia.”
Medieval Christmas, like its pagan ancestor, was a raucous,
usually drunken affair. Many dioceses had a “feast of fools,” in
which one of the lower clergy was temporarily installed as a
“bishop of fools” and fun was made of church ceremonial. In
France, churches held a “fete de l’ane,” in honor of the donkey
who brought Mary to Bethlehem. Outside the church there was
community-wide feasting, drinking and, it’s safe to assume, sex.
But with the Reformation, things changed. Many Protestant
sects abolished Christmas as a medieval corruption. It was
banned in Scotland in 1563 and in England when the Puritans
defeated and executed Charles I. Puritan New England also did
not celebrate Christmas. Although the holiday was revived after
the Restoration, it never again recovered its raucous medieval
ways. Instead, it became a much more family-oriented occasion.
Modern Myth
In the early 19th century, a group of New York writers,
including John Pintard, Washington Irving and especially Clement
Clarke Moore, established the modern American secular Christmas
myth centered on children, with Santa Claus carrying presents in
his reindeer-powered sleigh and popping down chimneys to deliver
them. Poinsettias, which have become associated with Christmas
because they bloom in December, were unknown until the American
minister to Mexico, Joel Roberts Poinsett, brought them back
from there in 1828. In the mid-19th century the cartoonist
Thomas Nast created the modern image of Santa Claus as a jolly
fat man with a white beard. (The red suit became standard only
in the 1920s, thanks to Coca-Cola ads.) Christmas trees came to
the English-speaking world about the same time, when the German
Prince Albert -- some of whose ancestors were doubtless pagan
tree worshippers -- married Queen Victoria.
Merchants, needless to say, pushed the idea of gift-giving,
decorating their stores and having sales. As Christian sects
that celebrated Christmas, such as Catholics and Anglicans,
began to move into New England, where Christmas had been unknown
in colonial times, the holiday was slowly revived there.
Pressure from children (“The O’Reilly kids down the street are
getting presents. Why aren’t we!?”) certainly helped. Churches
that had previously not celebrated Christmas, such as the
Presbyterians and Congregationalists, began to do so. Again, it
was a marketing ploy, to keep congregants from migrating to
churches that did celebrate Christmas.
The poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow noted in 1856, “A
transition state about Christmas here in New England. The old
puritan feeling prevents it from being a cheerful, hearty
holiday; though every year makes it more so.” More and more
states, including those in New England, made Christmas a legal
holiday and in 1870, President Ulysses S. Grant signed it into
law as a federal holiday.
Today this secular Christmas is celebrated around the world
even in countries, such as Japan and South Korea, where only a
small percentage of the population is Christian. One of the most
famous Christmas songs ever written, “White Christmas,” was
written by Irving Berlin, who was Jewish.
So perhaps even First Amendment absolutists who picket
stagings of “A Christmas Carol” and decry poinsettias as a
Christian symbol should just relax. The Christmas of the Virgin
Mary and the manger, the three kings and “Silent Night” is a
Christian holy day celebrating the birth of Jesus. The Christmas
of Santa Claus and Christmas trees, presents and parties and
“Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” is a winter solstice festival
celebrating the rebirth of the sun.
(John Steele Gordon is the author of numerous books,
including “Hamilton’s Blessing: The Extraordinary Life and Times
of Our National Debt.” The opinions expressed are his own.) | | |
| This has been another wonderful year. I'm thankful for the wonderful people in my life - friends & family. I'm thankful that I have a job - not one that I love, but at least it allows me to do what I love. I'm thankful to have gone on so many adventures & have so many awesome memories. Most importantly, I'm thankful to be alive and happy. Happy Thanksgiving!!
37 days left in 2011 - I can't wait to make some more wonderful memories before this year ends. <3 | | |
| It's true what they say, time flies when you're having fun... Q3 really flew by - I got to travel and visited friends and family in Asia, attended several weddings, and became a bit more financially responsible (or at least made more responsible decisions). Life is starting to come together nicely and although I'm still trying to figure out where it's heading, at least I know I'm heading in the right direction.
Asia was definitely an adventure! 2 weeks, 1 backpack, 2 countries, 12 cities, and 6,000 pictures. Enough said. =)
2011 Goals completed in Q3:
3. Viet Nam to visit family / S. Korea (Aug 26 - Sept 11)
4. Make-A-Wish – completed 1st wish (6/13), 2nd wish (7/9)
6. Minneapolis, MN (June 9-12)
22. Temecula's Wine & Balloon Festival (June 2-4)
23. San Francisco again (2/19 - 2/21, 7/2 – 7/4)
24. Glendale, AZ (7/15 – 7/17) | | |
| Anxiety. I'm finally going back to Viet Nam after 13 years... 1 day until our big trip and I'm getting nervous and anxious. All of my cousins have grown up and are either in college or working... my grandpa is no longer with us... there are a lot of changes within our family and in the country as a whole. I'm not sure what to expect, but I'm just hoping for the best. I still have 24hrs to think of all of the possibilities, 12.5 restless hours on the plane to think, and then it's onward to one of the best adventures of the year! Wish me luck. =) | | |
|
