A completely unrelated observation

[petronia]

I've been eating a lot of instant ramen for lunch these days, and the stuff keeps getting fancier and fancier - especially since mainland China figured out freeze-dry technology and got busy reproducing regional variations in all their glory. Right now I'm having instant Lanzhou pulled noodles, seasoned with coriander and yak meat, or so claims the package; not sure I believe it. Have also had Sichuan hot-and-sour rice vermicelli, with chili paste, balsamic rice vinegar and dried yellow peas (I wasn't even sure what to do with that packet). Neither type was fried. I think this makes them not instant anything technically, just regular noodles. And the whole thing takes me up to 10 minutes to make anyway, microwaved batch-wise in my single-serving Corning glassware bowl and watched like a hawk to keep it from boiling over, so maybe the lesson to be learnt here is how to duplicate the recipe in a non-instantaneous-and-freeze-dried fashion.

There's the Korean varieties, like spicy seafood udon and green seaweed ramen. And of course the Japanese - miso broth, shoyu broth, sukiyaki broth, with sesame seed oil, and on and on. It's actually kind of embarrassing how much I like instant ramen. Were I to finally visit Tokyo, I would definitely check out the Ramen Museum. XD

Hmm, have a meme (from usomitai, lazulisong, etc.):

How many times has someone on your friends list posted about something and you were really confused, but you didn't want to ask because you thought you should know? How many times have you felt 'guilty' asking an LJ friend a question that should be 'obvious'? Well, here's your chance. I'll answer nearly any questions (random or serious), even if you're curious about more than one thing or are new to my friends list.

Not that I wouldn't answer questions otherwise, but people say things in passing like, oh yeah I have no idea what Sabina's talking about sometimes! Which I find alarming. XD;

Comments

[niche.livejournal.com]

how do you really manage to think in text? XD and i mean, if these questions extend also to random questions about yourself (which i suspect not, but i love asking (potentially intrusive -_-) questions about other people) as opposed to your thought process, do you plan your stories before writing them? what do you do in your spare time aside from attending crazy gigs and listening to electronica and eating instant ramen? what is the best ramen you've ever tasted? what's your favourite place/country to ravel to?

okay, so many only because i find it so difficult to get to know people sometimes just based on their ljs alone. :0 don't mind me if it's not allowed!

[petronia.livejournal.com]

kay, I will try to answer these separately. XD

how do you really manage to think in text?

I don't think I did before I started blogging regularly. XD I tried for a long time to keep a diary during my teens but I was never very good at it. I just... do the equivalent of composing an essay in my head, I guess? About anything. EVERYTHING. Probably only a small proportion of this becomes real LJ fodder, but the habit itself is what made me the fearsome precise thinker I am today LULZZZ.

Basically I'm very visually oriented, to the point that I "see" music, and when people read out loud I tend to visualise it as a scrolling line of text in my head and read that, and that's how I understand. XD;; I also have prophetic dreams about Livejournal. It's all kind of lame when you get down to it.

do you plan your stories before writing them?

I try to, these days. I use to start long stories without planning them out but would invariably get stuck because of logical failure in the plot. That being said my story plans have a lot of **INSERT WITTY DIALOGUE AND EMOTIONAL REVELATION HERE**.

what do you do in your spare time aside from attending crazy gigs and listening to electronica and eating instant ramen?

I eat out a lot with friends. I eat out a lot by myself (restaurants, cafés). I... eat a lot, period. =_= More rarely, I cook. I read a lot. Books, magazines, and newspapers, but also tons of completely random shiz on the Internet. More rarely, I write. THE PARALLELS ARE NOT LOST ON ME I ASSURE YOU.

I also enjoy shopping, strolls through picturesque areas, photography, museums, yoga, and so on. But mostly, eating and reading. XD

what is the best ramen you've ever tasted?

Probably the objectively best ramen I've had was with friends in Singapore, because it was an actual proper ramenya (there is no such thing in Montreal, may as well stick with instant XD;). But food is also who you eat it with, and how hungry you are.

what's your favourite place/country to travel to?

Oh, man, I don't think I have a favorite? Discounting Shanghai, it's not like I travel anywhere repeatedly. Some places in the world are magical (Venice, New York) but they are magical for everyone. Alternately, sometimes the magic in memory is tied up with the taste of tea in a given apartment with a given person and none of those things are there anymore, even if you go back. So.

[niche.livejournal.com]

i'm a very visual person as well but i think a lot in pictures. if someone asks me what i feel about ____ i can't really put it into words, so i describe the feelings i have in pictures.

also, prophetic dreams about LJ, what? XD

i ask the question about planning because i've never planned any of my stories and they sort of meander along because i don't really care about plot, then i realise i've written a whole load of stuff and nothing's actually happened and i get pissed off. so i'm wondering if people who write plot actually plan or are just really focused. :0

i also love yoga! eating not so much because it's so tiring. :( i hate making food and buying food is really expensive, so i'd just rather rot at home and eat only when there's food around. (which store in singapore did you have your ramen at?)

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I often dream about LJ posts and comment threads that don't actually take place until later. LAMEST PSYCHIC POWER EVER, RITE.

I can't remember the name of the ramen place, but nearish the river? And it was Hokkaido ramen I think.

[helvetius.livejournal.com]

Miharu at Robertson Quay. ;)

[sub-divided.livejournal.com]

Why are you getting an MBA, again? ^^; Besides parental pressure. Is there a specific thing you need it for?

How often do you drink, and how often do you drink alone?

Other blogs/print magazines you think impacted your style? And I don't mean writing style, but STYLE AS A BLOGGER.

Best part/worst part about your (ex)job? (Okay, this isn't something I've been wondering about forever, but I guess I am kind of curious.)

[petronia.livejournal.com]

MBA: I guess... there are a lot of reasons, after all. XD I've been telling people I want to go back to Shanghai and work there for a couple of years, because things are interesting there right now, and because of my grandparents. Also, to get out of the CS technical ghetto and be able to jump into and work in other industries, at a level where you get to see and play with the big picture.

More abstractly, I just want to go back to school and do all the schtuff I didn't do the first time around when I thought it was SRS BZNS. XD Like extracurriculars, foreign exchange, socializing in general. Even more abstractly than that, for the same fundamental reason I did Comp Sci in undergrad, i.e. these are the fields of knowledge you need in order to be the 21st century equivalent of a Renaissance Man, really (plus loads of other stuff I'm not convinced I need to go to school to learn XD). I don't want to program for a living but I've never felt that getting a CS degree was a waste of time, for that reason. It's the same kind of assurance you get from being able to fix a car engine or do your own plumbing, I guess.

How often do I drink: 1-3 drinks per week on average, as of the moment, which historically speaking isn't much. XD I went through a period where I would drink a lot alone, experiment with cocktail recipes, get drunk in order to write, and so on. Lately I just drink a lot of tea and tisane, and have a beer when out with friends.

Will answer the others later. XD

[absenceofmind.livejournal.com]

how is it that you are so well-read and intelligent, and yet still profess to like happy, cliched pr0n?

WHY DO YOU RARELY WRITE ANY YOURSELF. i am still bitter that there was NEVER any momoryo.

i love you, sabina. you're like the onee-san i look up to EVEN IF YOU AREN'T REALLY OLDER THAN ME. physically, at least. most fourteen year olds are mentally older than me. subtract five years for my current obsession with JE.

[absenceofmind.livejournal.com]

also, are you offended by the fact that i sometimes consider you too intelligent for me to read? i become very worried about reading your stuff because i'm afraid i'm too dumb to like it properly.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I'm not offended but it makes me kind of ;_; because I don't think I deserve that judgment. XD My opinion of my own writing is that I synthesize a lot of odd bits and pieces of knowledge in my stories but it's all presented in an above-board fashion - there's no deep symbolism or code to crack if you knew more about neurochemistry or Hungarian literature of the Middle Ages, yanno? Like... if something feels unspoken and significant it's probably just for the sake of evoking that emotion, because I like the aesthetic melancholy or whatever. It's really not that deep. XD

[absenceofmind.livejournal.com]

XD it does help to know that sometimes it's for aesthetics? because with some writers, you know, it's NOT. really, my paranoia is also in part because i'm a lazy reader--sort of want to be fed something clever enough to amuse but not that i need to actively work my way through. as a result i skim an awful lot and uh, sometimes that works not so well.

i guess what i want is for you to leave a commentary for your stories XD optional commentary for those who want to go with their own interpretations, but because there is so much LOGIC behind your stories, i feel i want to follow it!

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I don't know why you contrast these qualities as if they're mutually exclusive! ^^; Where does it say that you can't be well-read and intelligent and... still like reading romance? I know there's no rule that says you can't be smart and still like pr0n, because then we'd all be screwed.

Writing may be a separate question. ^^; I've wondered myself, and at this point my best answer is: it's not my style as a writer. ^^;; When I was younger I used to worry about being derivative of my favorite authors, not having anything of my own to say, etc., but these days I don't worry about it as much because I find I do have things to say with my writing that (objectively) are pretty individualistic. But it is all weird shit. XD;; Apparently that is just who I am!?

[absenceofmind.livejournal.com]

actually, i really have no right to even say that to you XD you gave the world SSBB, and the world had darn better be grateful.

i think i just feel guilty for liking to read it--writing it is a bit like pulling teeth, but i do it almost from a sense of--ha!--civic duty.

there is some advantage of being a philistine. i have never read enough to borrow from anyone's style. on the whole this is probably a negative because almost everyone improves through imitation.

[maeran.livejournal.com]

INSTANT RAMEN. *___* (Nong Shim, my eternal love~)

Damn, that makes me hungry. T__T And I'm not allowed to have food right now.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Nong Shim ♥

I need to start making it at home so I can put vegetables in, though. XD

[astrael-nyx.livejournal.com]

Oh, instant ramen. How I love you, yet must reject you because you're so grossly unhealthy. The Nissin "Yut Ding" sesame oil flavour in the red packaging with the little ramen delivery boy in the front will always be my favourite as it was (though some places in the name of cost-effectiveness substitute crap brands) and still is a mainstay in HK diner fare. I quite like the "Chinese ramen" kind and the egg noodles-esque fare (Noodle King?) with the flavours in abalone and wonton as they're not fried (I think) and they have them in largish paper cups. And they come with a teeny tiny plastic fork which is totally useless, but it's the thought that counts?

If you microwave instant stuff -- the best stuff is vermicelli or rice noodles -- the non-fried stuff. If you break the dried noodles in half, then cover with a minimum of water, it might not boil over as quickly?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Demae Icchou, yes~ XD 出前一丁万歳！

I have been breaking the noodles in half and portioning out the contents of the soup packets, mostly. That's why it takes so long, because I have to cook it and eat twice.

[one-if-by-land.livejournal.com]

did you ever go through an awkward teenage phase that you're embarrassed of, i.e. is there any hope for the rest of us (me) to turn out okay in the end. T_T

[petronia.livejournal.com]

You are 100x better at being a teenager than I ever was. XD At various or all times I had bad hair, bad teeth, bad skin, bad vision, bad clothes, and nonexistent social skills. I only had a couple of friends, and my life consisted of going from home to school and school back to home.

As you see I'm not hugely embarrassed about it though. XD I dunno - at the time I was just a dorky, happy kid. After I graduated high school and started trying to "improve" myself, that's when I had all the (unrelated) emotional crises. At the same time it's when I made my most long-lasting friends, got into fandom, etc.

I guess to me, my life/self is also a WIP, like something I'm writing? I feel like I'm in charge/control of it in the same way. So it's like, obviously the first draft is going to be crap, you just have to keep editing until you're satisfied. XD;

[one-if-by-land.livejournal.com]

well, you seem to have gathered yourself together pretty fast. XD I just remember a statement you made a long time ago, about how you think of yourself like a wine or cheese and age better with time and therefore you look immensely forward to turning 30. that's a very interesting statement, imo, one that requires a lot of self-assurance and a lack of regrets and to youth, which always made me wonder if you just matured at the age of like, 12, and have been you ever since. XD

[pere-chan.livejournal.com]

I too am an instant ramen fanatic. Sometimes I like to mix and match, like I will have KOKA spicy stir-fry sauce with Sapporo Ichiban noodles meant to be chicken flavoured. And I add sesame oil to everything, which is sometimes a mistake ^^;

re. your meme...I just try to absorb everything you talk about. When I'm lazy I take it at face value, but more often than not I'm curious and so I'll look it up somewhere. I think I like your ramblier posts more because they read like a Heian-era-type pillow book...I understand some of what you're talking about, and the rest of it sort of floats by but is fun to read anyway.

What I really want to know is your secret language of icons. I love finding out exactly what it is they all mean--like which ones are album covers or in-jokes or nerd shoutouts. I think you did another meme like that once.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

http://www.livejournal.com/allpics.bml?user=petronia

I think that link works? My userpics are annotated in great detail. XD

[pere-chan.livejournal.com]

Always a joy :D

[marourin.livejournal.com]

>.>; feel free to yell at me if I'm not doing this right but I couldn't find your contact info (I could just be dumb) but I was wondering about the details for the cover art for issue #12 of s2b2 (and volunteering, subesquently)? And...uhm...about the happy feel good stories? For this particular issue does it also have to be like that?

my aim is the same as my LJ if you want to give me a tongue lashing over that >.>;

and I sparkle at the ramen *-* we don't have such a nice selection here where I am ;o;

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Oh, if you need me in an editorial capacity you could just send me an email at shousetsubangbang at gmail dot com (the fic/art submission addy). *g* Or leave me a comment on the signup post for issue 12.

The cover art is assigned for the next two issues, actually. XD; The next one open is February. It's usually associated with one of the stories in the issue, so I prefer it if the artist illustrates a couple of times for SSBB first - just to know they can handle it - but I guess you're signed up to do that already? As for happy-feel-good endings, it's not a rule, but it's always preferred.