The tendon/ligament (for once! a word I know how to say in Chinese but not in English) in my neck is frickin swollen, and it hurts. Like. A lot. Like, it's not a constant pain, but I get these sharp, shooting pains every two seconds. Sigh. It hurts. :( I don't know how to make it go away, especially considering how I have to sit in front of the computer for at least two more days. Speaking of which, I probably shouldn't be sitting in front of my computer right now, but there's nothing else I can do that doesn't cause the same pain anyway.

I can't draw because I have to bend my neck down since I don't have a desk (although I did attempt to draw some, but the pain kinda distracted me). I can't read because of the same reason. I can't watch tv because the sofa is perpendicular to the TV so I'd have to turn my head to see it. SIGH. I guess I could go to bed, but that means I need to go shower, but I don't want to because that means I have to wash my hair which will probably involve more neck pain. WAAAAAH.

Why is it swollen? I have no idea except that the muscles in my shoulder are super sore as well. AHHHHHHHH. This sucks. SUCKS. I'm not even old yet and I have all these health problems. SIGH.

Yes, this is a self-pitying, whining-filled entry. I think it's about time for another one anyway.

Three things to be noted:

1. I got my first real paycheck on Friday; real as in being paid for a full-time-(9-6)-with-benefits-and-no-jeans-allowed job.

2. My family (including the extended relatives) has this tradition where whenever we get our first real paycheck, we treat them to food. One of my previous entries was about treating my relatives to fooding because of this tradition, but that was technically before I got my real paycheck.

3. I owe my cousin and her boyfriend and my sister big time for taking care of me while I adapted to this semi-new environment and totally-new, non-student lifestyle. Taking care of me in the sense of making sure I am well-fed (fattie) and treating me many a-times before.

SO! I decided to treat them, on Friday night, to good food, and I decided on French food. I wanted to go to another French restaurant that I'd tried out senior year in high school and enjoyed, but for some reason, four of its six stores had closed down, and the two remaining were either too expensive or too far. After some searching online, we settled on L'Appetit in the East side of Taipei. The price seemed decent, and the reviews seemed good, so we thought we'd give it a shot. Why not!

Not the best French food I've ever had, but then again, I guess you just can't really compare French food in Taipei to French food in France, even if the chef is French. Working with different available ingredients always makes for different tastes, and I'm sure there's a certain challenge to making authentic French food when you're not exactly in France. Anyway, it was good, enjoyable, and very filling. The service was really good, though. The waiter spent like 10 minutes introducing us to the various wines they carried and in the end had to actually pick one for us since we couldn't decide. Thank God for good service! (Especially when you get charged for that service). Anyway, here are some (by some I mean lots of) pictures ....

L'Appetit's sign.

A shot of the interior that doesn't quite do it justice. I missed out on a couple of areas, but the general atmosphere was pretty cozy and nice. There weren't too many people there when we first arrived, probably because we went a bit early. More people started arriving when we were mid-way through our meal.

Yummy pickled olives. That's all I can say. SO GOOD.

Bottle of red, thanks to my sister. From the southwest of France and pretty decent. Yay for good choice made by Mr. Waiter.

First up, soup! Vegetable soup, to be more exact, made of seven (or was it eight ...) different veggies, but it predominantly tasted like carrots.

Les escargots, anybody? Oh-so-yum! Who knew snails could taste so good?

Another yum appetizer - potato gratin. The name they gave it was much more sophisticated and better sounding, but too long for me to remember. >.< Anyway, potatoes, cheese, and bacon. Can't go wrong with that combination. Yum!

The third appetizer - camambert (sp?) cheese and some other stuffs. The cheese was the best part :P

Main course for my sister and me was steak, which was decent, but the steak was kinda chewy (not in a good way). Meh.

Should've gotten the ribs - that was tasty. (Oh man, Fergie's gotten to me; I spelled tasty t-a-s-t-e-y before realizing my mistake. T~T)

And then there was the fish, which was pretty good, too; but meh, not a big fan of fish.

The dessert! Number one - some sort of chocolate cake, which I enjoyed. Thoroughly.

Number two - some kind of roll, which was ok.

Number three - not sure what exactly this was, but it was yum!

Number four - the best one!!! creme brulee .... so good. SO GOOD. ahhhh, too bad so small and the four of us had to share it ... haha. :P

Anyway, the participants of our French cuisine night:

The sister (aka Cathy)

The cousin and boyfriend (aka Karen and Ryan)

Et moi! (and Ryan who looks like a sketchy doode here).

I think I need to start taking more and better pictures of humans and stop focusing as much on food. One can see where my priorities lie. :P

T'was a good and filling dinner; good thing we went walking afterwards to digest. Mmmm, I love French food.

I recently started drawing my usual designs on different mediums instead of my normal paper; thought I'd share. :)


First one - fabric paint and Chinese ink on canvas. Fabric paint was supposed to be for me to paint on fabric, but I had no available fabric, so I used it for the canvas. Paintbrushes are ridiculously hard to control, that's why I ended up using Chinese ink - that brush was way easier to use and thinner too.


My desk at home is actually an ironing board, so I used a piece of cardboard to put my computer on so that my mbp doesn't end up overheating. Anyway, decided to draw on that cardboard, et voila!


It's a ... bottle! I used to draw on bottles a lot back in high school during class (heehee). The designs were way different from now, but that's where this inspiration came from. I wish I'd kept some of those bottles instead of throwing them away every time I finished. Ah well, I've learned my lesson.


Another bottle, but this time it's a glass one. I think I like glass bottles better, not sure why, but it's easier to draw on. Anyway, learned from drawing on the plastic bottle that drawing all the way around makes it kind of too busy and messy, so ended up just drawing on one side. There's actually a little boy on the back (right pic), but the reflection from the camera flash covered him up. :(


Finally found me some fabric for my fabric paint. Got a white hat that someone didn't mind being ruined. It turned out better than I expected when I first started. Paint brush was hard to wield, as I knew from before, but the fabric made it even harder, so there are still some bits of white. Luckily, I had the smart/stupid idea of using a toothpick to do the smaller, more detailed lines. Aih, it took forever, but I'm pretty happy w/ the end result. Still trying to decide whether to just leave as is or actually fill up the bill with the designs. I've been told to leave as is, so I just might.

One thing I've decided - I need to get me a real desk with a desk lamp so I don't end up with a dead shoulder (it's on its way to being dead) and pained neck and blind eyes.