25 Facts: Just a friendly reminder that you don't want me on your friends' page, and I'm an asshole
Everyone seems to be posting 25 random facts about themselves in a note on Facebook. To be honest, a part of me wants to create such a note and tag my best friend Simon just to piss him off. Because that’s how I show my love: by pissing him off- yet another characteristic I have in common with his adorable but annoying puppy. But, he is lucky that I have too little of an attention span to sit down and think up 25 random facts at one time. So, I’m just going to indulge my love to list and list the ones I think of as they come to me. [Edit: This took me so many MONTHS that I lost count.]
1. I applied to USC on a whim because I really missed my first love. When I was accepted, I went to USC purely because he was there. Apparently everyone and their mom (really, even people’s moms knew my real reason for going to LA) except my first love knew why I had packed my bags and traveled across the country, and it wasn’t for the weather.
2. The sketchbook that I am currently working in is my favorite, and it is partly because my best friend Naomi gave it to me the summer before my sophomore year in an effort to get me to start drawing again because I had basically created no art for over a year.
3. It was not until after I gained 20 lbs during the fall semester of my junior year that I realized that I could not just coast by on my fast metabolism, and I started living a drastically healthier life by being more conscious of the food I eat and going to the gym on a regular basis. And I managed to drop the 20 lbs in three months during the following spring semester.
4. The most frequent comment I receive is: You are so much more interesting than I thought you would be. This is usually because most people tend to think, as my best friend MiRi, put it: “I thought, ‘Oh my god. She has pretty eyes. I hate her.’ Then I thought ‘She’s so quiet! She’s one of those girls that all the guys like because she’s so feminine and pretty!’ WOW, I was so wrong. You are not quiet. Not feminine. At least not in personality? Who burps like that?!”
5. I do not know how to receive compliments (Honestly, what do you say? Thank you? Oh no, but you’re so sweet? Hell yea, I’m glad you recognize I’m the shit? You know, that’s what the little voices in my head tell me every morning?) because often when I am complimented, this is what happens: a man who I don’t know will walk up to me, compliment me, and walk away. No response from me seems necessary.
6. My favorite store is Trader Joe’s. My shopping there on my weekends is the highlight of my week. And I will go even though my pantry is way too full; I have nothing in mind to buy; and my roommates are watching me like a guard dog to see that I don’t leave to go there because they think my obsession is a little too enthusiastic (and obviously weird), and they are getting really, really full. But it’s hard for me to resist a store that has such low prices, good food, and a willingness to give me a red balloon just for looking happy.
7. I was in love with a man who I was never with in a relationship because he decided that he didn’t want to date a girl who whined like a puppy when she has to go out into the rain, thinks the determinants of a good career fair is how many stuffed Target dogs, boxes of cereal, and candy she is able to score, and giggles when she clicks her heels together like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz before going outside. Obviously, he is an idiot. I think it’s okay to say that my heart demonstrates the occasional bad judgment in the men it chooses to love; it must be all the chick flicks I get dragged to that convince my already hopelessly romantic heart that sometimes, sometimes, sometimes the quirky girl gets the guy.
8. I will almost never buy anything that has not been marked down or price-checked unless I know for a fact that I cannot find a less expensive, authentic version elsewhere. I will compare prices of all my groceries and won’t buy groceries at one store if I know I can buy it for less at another store, and I will just go to that store afterwards. Yes, this is my how I get my ya-yas (definition here) since I’m HORRIBLE at team sports; I am a great team player, but I am often afraid of the ball. Oh dear, such a predicament!
9. I adore my mom. She is the main reason why I always returned home at every break. The most reassuring and funniest thing she has ever said to me was: “No sex with boys. If you get pregnant, I don’t have time to take care of a baby, and your dad doesn’t know what to do with one.” It’s nice to know I wouldn’t get disowned or have to have an abortion if I had gotten pregnant during college. The second funniest was when my incredibly sweet and always polite mom told me that I was prettier than another girl because I had beautiful eyes.
10. I adore cereal. Hmm, scratch that. I’m addicted to cereal. My best and favorite freebie that I scored at a recent career fair was a box of chocolate Chex from the General Mills booth. I ate the entire box in three days; I was seriously pacing myself because otherwise I would have eaten it all in one hour. The thing is: I don’t eat my cereal with milk. I eat it dry and with several cups of water. This is probably the best way for me to remember that I am human and I need to drink water, otherwise I do forget and will accidentally go one or two days without drinking water or any liquid, actually.
11. I carry around two pictures of me. The first being the cut-out picture of my first driver’s license that I had to surrender in order to receive my full license. It is the only good picture of me that I have taken without having to re-shoot so far at that time in my life. I also carry my school picture from when I was in the 6th grade. I was overweight with acne, and I wore large, round glasses. I also had an awkward smile. It is the worst picture I have ever taken and my favorite picture of me. I like to show it to guys who are interested in me and then tell them that our future daughter will probably look like that; just to see their responses. Which brings me to…
12. I like test my boundaries with people I care about to see how much of my personality they can handle. My roommate likened me to House from “House, MD” until she realized she would be Wilson, then she took it back.
13. I am really attracted to really intelligent guys who read a lot. I prefer a guy who is smarter than I am, has an Eddie Izzard sense of humor, and has a floor covered in books. My friends call me a zombie because I love brains.
14. Below 72 degrees, I give up on looking fashionable or even remotely decent. I will wear the same red or grey USC and pair of jeans for consecutive days (okay, let’s be honest here, when I say “days” I really do mean “weeks”), with my hair in a messy bun or ponytail, and it is debatable if I washed my face before going to class. It’s my version of cold and I like to maximize my time in my warm bed, so my only focus is making to class remotely on time. What I find funny though is that I go to a school that seems to regularly be in the top 5 of the schools with the hottest undergrads. Luckily, my self-confidence is stronger than Fort Knox, and it helps that I know that when I do resume regular human hygiene, I’m fucking adorable and pretty hot.
15. My name is Jenny. Don’t call me “Jen”; I won’t respond. My inner five year old will be so angry and stomping around in my heart in choleric protest. When I was five, my parents allowed me to pick an American name because the pronunciation of my Chinese name was just too difficult to a class of kindergartners who couldn’t even say “Tiffany” or “Rachel” correctly. “Chenfang” just blew their minds. My parents gave me a baby book and told me the Chinese equivalent of “go to town”. I picked “Jenny”. I love “Jenny”. I threw a huge fit when they asked me to consider “Jennifer” because they thought it was prettier, more sophisticated. I wanted “Jenny” and no other variation; not “Jennifer”, and certainly not “Jen”, which I thought was a bastardization of my name. The only person I allowed to call me “Jen” was my elementary librarian whom I loved because she so encouraged my love of books. The only person I allow to call me “JenJen” is Simon because I put him through so much hell throughout the years that I honestly don’t understand how else we are still best friends if it weren’t for his understanding and loyalty; obviously I have to let him call me any nickname he pleases- I’m just thankful he doesn’t have my sense of humor and hasn’t considered pulling a Michael Jackson by calling me “Blanket”. The only person I allow to call me “Jennay” is my new friend Mehal because he reminds me of Simon.
16. I love my best friends. Of course they are sweet. Of course they are intelligent. Of course they are fun. Each is so unique that I know I won’t find another like her (honestly, another girl who calls herself “Hamster” and has an obsession with ladybugs?). But what makes me love them, makes it impossible for me to even be annoyed at them, is how much I trust them and feel safe with them. Trust in the sense that I know that what they think of me and what they say about me are the same things they say to my face, even if what they are saying is “fucktard” for trying to invent my own form of Morse code to communicate with one of them through a shared wall instead of studying. Safe in the sense that regardless of what happens, no matter how far I am from them or how long I have been away, the support, the caring, the understanding will always be available when I need it. Like family, they have my best interests at heart and leave the door open for me to return.
17. I fail at being a vegetarian. Truly, I’m pescetarian, which is a stopover on the way to vegetarian, wherein I give up all meats except for seafood. It’s cheating, I know. But I’m getting there. Progress! I still eat meat occasionally, but I save it for special people. Here’s the breakdown: if we’re just friends, I stick with my tofu, vegetables, and fake meat substitutes. If I care about the person, I’ll eat fish. If I really, really like a person, I’ll eat chicken. If I love the person, I’ll eat beef or pork. Luckily, the number of people I love enough to eat chicken, beef, or pork is so small that I don’t even use all the fingers of one hand. So if I eat a cow, feel fucking special (You are the reason why I'll be constipated for DAYS. You owe me an Ex-lax).
18. Suddenly, I am a morning person. I say suddenly because it feels like such a huge and drastic change for me that I am still adjusting to the idea, but, in reality, I have been a morning person since April 2008 when I started waking up naturally at 6 or 7 AM. It wasn’t a one day fluke. It continued for a month before I stopped thinking it was a fluke. And it continues to this day, which makes it very unfortunate when I fall asleep in the very early morning while the sun is in the middle of its REM cycle because I still wake up around 7 AM. However, waking up early did not mean that I was early or on time for my 11 AM class; I was always 5 minutes late.
19. I tend to overreact to everything, but I become offended by next to nothing. I rarely get angry and, even then, I forgive easily. I smile so widely my cheeks hurt, laugh so loudly that it comes from the stomach and my sides hurt, and wave my hands in excitement so chaotically, I’ll hit people and they hurt. I am just too happily enthusiastic for words, and it could be detrimental to my and others’ health.
20. I adore Kate Spade because of the shared absolute adoration of Audrey Hepburn and shared appreciation for bright solid colors, whimsical polka dots, and clean lines. I not-so-secretly, desperately want to be like Audrey Hepburn, but my Kathy Griffin mouth has me falling short.
21. I have been sleeping with a green furry blanket since winter of my senior year of high school. It is essentially my security blanket because I hate to sleep without it unless I absolutely have to. It was the last thing my maternal grandfather gave me before he died that winter. When I sleep with it, it makes me feel closer to the my family, which was crucial when I lived in LA and so far away from my mom.
22. My favorite things are the things people have given me over the years. I sleep with them surrounding me: my green furry blanket that my grandfather gave me, the teddy bear wearing a USC hoodie that Chengyee gave me, my sketchbook that Naomi gave me, the penguin that Simon gave me, and the Dr. Pepper hoodie that my boyfriend lent me. It makes sleeping with me in my bed slightly uncomfortable, especially during the period of time when I brought my drawing tools into bed with me- waking up with a pencil poking me in the back was not pleasant.
23. I am like a bored computer: left alone for ten minutes and I will hibernate. And like my own computer, I will beep very loudly and sharply if poked during hibernation. I can count the number of sleepless nights I’ve had in my life on one hand- and only then was it because of severe emotional distress. I fall asleep so easily that it’s surprising I’m not narcoleptic. I’ve fallen asleep in a bathroom sink and slept quite soundly until my mom woke me up the next morning, first, angry when she thought her daughter had snuck out during the middle of the night, and, then, confused why her daughter had chosen to fall asleep in a hard, porcelain, tiny bathroom sink when her daughter had a perfectly comfortable bed, designed for sleeping.
24. Maybe it’s because I really adore certain movies, or maybe it’s because I have the attention span of a peanut, but I love watching the same movie over and over and over…and over and over. The movies that I have re-watched so many times that the numbers are in the 50’s are: “Miracle on 34th St”, “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”, “Wall-e”, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”, “When Harry Met Sally”, and “Bridget Jones’s Diary”. It is very easily gleaned that these movies are not thought-provoking or incredibly moving; in fact, most of these movies would probably drown if thrown into a lake because they barely know how to swim. These movies are the cinematic equivalent to chicken noodle soup…Well, chicken noodle soup eaten by a 5 year old who explodes into a fit of giggles when he is able to fit a piece of noodle up his nose- these movies are comedies. These movies are sweet, funny, and, most of all, reliably comforting in their familiarity.
25. For four years, I lived in the city that was gloriously sprawling and its tentacles of lights in the night-time extended to the ocean. It rains twice a year because the thunderclouds are in a courtship with Seattle and the sun has fallen under the same spell that beguiles and beckons thousands of hopeful actors to the city. The beaches were only minutes away and farmer’s markets were a foodie’s wet dream. I loved the city because for four years it was home and my roommates were my family. I cried at the thought of leaving and I fought so hard to stay. However, when I moved back to the East Coast, I realized it was the best decision that I ever made because I met my soulmate. He is someone who makes me smile so widely that my cheeks hurt; someone who is gifted with infinite patience and a very good sense of humor; someone who tries so hard to make me happy that his efforts alone make me dizzy with euphoria; someone who understands my idiosyncrasies and embraces them wholeheartedly. Because of him, I don’t care where I live and I gladly gave up the second chance to live in my former home. For him, I would be happily move anywhere as long as we are still able hold hands when we fall asleep at night. He is my everything.