I’m sitting at my parents’ townhouse in Northern Virginia, at the dining room directly across the kitchen where my mother is killing cockroaches. While the click-clacks from my typing is fluid and mellow, the bangs she makes from slamming napkins over a silently screaming brown bug are loud and unpredictable.
It’s an old complex, so dynasties of cockroaches have been out partying every night, and they’re not gonna stop just because someone sprays a few rounds of insect repellant. They’ve built generations of tolerance, I’m sure of it.

It’s funny. At any other place, even my own apartment in Los Angeles, I would be shrieking obscenities and devising cruel plans to terminate these pests (remember the mice?). But here at my parents’ house, just as these cockroaches have developed genes to overcome chemicals, our family has built a disgruntled endurance for their presence.

It’s good to be home again, just in time for Christmas. Outside, the sky is brushed heavily with bluish-gray clouds, and the cars and grounds crunch with frozen water and snow. The heater in my house is kind of broken, so I sit bundled up in my brother’s sweatshirt, my dad’s parka, and my mom’s scarf. Or maybe I’m just a Cali-spoiled wuss.

 This beach feels sooo far away right now in gloomy East Coast weather.

Anyway. hello everyone, if you’re still following. It’s been a long time since I last blogged…but not for the lack of content. 

A flurry of events have been happening the last weeks. Things that make me want to hike up to the top of the mountains and scream, things that also make me want to wrap myself up in blankets and dream over Hookah.

A few times I snapped up my laptop, placed my wrists over the keyboard, and wanted to blog—but resisted because some things are just better left private between me and my girlfriends.

Sometimes, it’s just nice to type away for hours, save the file, and not publish it. The journalist in me always protest when I write something and it’s for my own eyes only—but I’m learning the sweetness of writing for the sole sake of clearing my head (and my heart). It’s just me, the words, and God’s always prying eyes (but we’re cool, Lord!).

I thought about closing down my blog when my blog host emailed me about renewing my contract. It would have saved me a couple hundred bucks, but I renewed it anyway because I have a strong feeling I’ll regret it if I don’t.

There might be some changes to do the way I blog now. Posts are going to be less frequent. And maybe less food-based. This blog has always been very open and personal, and it’ll continue to be. But it’s always been parceled around the topic of food. Though I still love food (once a foodie, always a foodie) and still eat out a lot, I haven’t been bringing out my camera. It felt weird at first not flashing my lens and elbows in a new restaurant, but now I’m so used to dining like—ahem—normal people that I actually forget about my camera.

Anyway, here’s my food picture of the day:
My mother’s Christmas dinner.

She made the spiciest, most delicious kimchi tuna stew (in the middle); spicy mackerel stew with loads of daikon radishes; kimbap (Korean sushi) with egg, hotdog, spinach, cucumber and carrots; a simple-dressed salad with grape tomatoes and avocados; stir-fried garlic shrimp; and steamed rice with beans.

Simple, Korean-style Christmas dinner. No turkey or ham for us. We’re a seafood-and-kimchi kind of family. We also each had a glass of my dad’s favorite red wine from Costco.

We clinked glasses, slurped noisily, and gave thanks for everything that led up to this dinner. Then we snacked on apples and peanuts and talked the night away.

Okay, this post really had no purpose except for me to pop my head in. I just wanted to blow the dust off this blog and say hello.

A Merry be-lated Christmas, everyone.

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