bless and the city

Truth. I’m exhausted.

Tue, 22 May 2012 05:20:44 +0800

Truth. I’m exhausted.

"Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some..."

Wed, 16 May 2012 23:46:06 +0800

“Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you.”

- 1 Peter 4:12 (KJV)

Photo

Wed, 16 May 2012 03:06:03 +0800

Cross the quad

Sun, 13 May 2012 03:28:40 +0800

Cross the quad

The Five-Year Plan Since before I can remember, I’ve had a...

Mon, 07 May 2012 23:32:38 +0800

The Five-Year Plan

Since before I can remember, I’ve had a solid five-year plan. I carried it around with me in my wallet, tweaking it on occasion, only to make the goals loftier. Upon my visit to Reggio ‘nell Emilia the summer after college graduation, I showed this plan to a group of Italian boys and they chortled: ‘How can you plan five years from now when you don’t know what will happen next week?’ Fair enough. I couldn’t. In these past two years I’ve strayed so far from my 21-year-old plans. As much as I’d like to, I can’t plan for things unknown. And today, in a moment of quarterlife crisis, I rehashed that plan and realized that truly, I am far from omnipotent.

Forget the five-year plan. There’s a plan out there infinitely better than I could ever envisage.

For the vision is yet for an appointed time and it hastens to the end [fulfillment]; it will not deceive or disappoint. Though it tarry, wait [earnestly] for it, because it will surely come; it will not be behindhand on its appointed day. Habakkuk 2:3

Coldplay - See You Soon (acoustic) Still one of my all-time...

Mon, 07 May 2012 12:35:02 +0800

Coldplay - See You Soon (acoustic)

Still one of my all-time favorites, soul soothing.

"Stars are beautiful, but they may not take an active part in anything, they must just look on for..."

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 23:15:01 +0800

“Stars are beautiful, but they may not take an active part in anything, they must just look on for ever. It is a punishment put on them for something they did so long ago that no star now knows what it was. So the older ones have become glassy-eyed and seldom speak (winking is the star language), but the little ones still wonder.”

- J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan (via colindwyer)

studentgastronomy: Truffle Mac and Cheese with Mushrooms I...

Sat, 28 Apr 2012 21:08:39 +0800

Robiola in Savoy

Truffle Mac and Cheese with Mushrooms

studentgastronomy:

Truffle Mac and Cheese with Mushrooms

I picked up a delicious robiola today at DiBruno’s:Robiola de Capra Incavolata from La Casera. This traditional Italian bloomy-rind goat’s milk cheese is wrapped in savoy cabbage and aged to perfection on the premises at DiBruno’s. It has that musky scent of cabbage, which also works to trap the moisture in the cheese and further ripen the cheese’s rind. Tart and fresh and perfect with a raisin pecan crisp.

Its sharp flavor was also the perfect complement to the truffle mac and cheese I had planned: penne pasta with just a touch of Robiola, Pleasant Ridge Reserve, Parmigiano, white truffle oil, balsamic glazed mushrooms, and garnished with toasted panko and basil. Yum!

If we weren’t eating out every night while I’m at my cousin Liana’s Penn graduation, I’d want to stay home at her flat in the Radian and make this exact meal. With a glass of her favourite Cloudy Bay, of course…

I’m suddenly ravenous.

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let..."

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 08:34:00 +0800

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”

- John 14:27 (NIV)

"Too often, the thing you want most is the one thing you can’t have. Desire leaves us heartbroken, it..."

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 12:24:31 +0800

“Too often, the thing you want most is the one thing you can’t have. Desire leaves us heartbroken, it wears us out. Desire can wreck your life and as tough as wanting something can be, the people who suffer the most are those who don’t know what they want.”

- Grey’s Anatomy (via littlemiss)

Don't worry

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 19:12:47 +0800

On August 8th of 1933, author F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote the following letter of advice to his 11-year-old daughter, “Scottie,” who was away at camp.

(Source: F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Life in Letters)

La Paix, Rodgers’ Forge
Towson, Maryland

August 8, 1933

Dear Pie:

I feel very strongly about you doing duty. Would you give me a little more documentation about your reading in French? I am glad you are happy — but I never believe much in happiness. I never believe in misery either. Those are things you see on the stage or the screen or the printed pages, they never really happen to you in life.

All I believe in in life is the rewards for virtue (according to your talents) and the punishments for not fulfilling your duties, which are doubly costly. If there is such a volume in the camp library, will you ask Mrs. Tyson to let you look up a sonnet of Shakespeare’s in which the line occurs “Lillies that fester smell far worse than weeds.”

Have had no thoughts today, life seems composed of getting up aSaturday Evening Post story. I think of you, and always pleasantly; but if you call me “Pappy” again I am going to take the White Cat out and beat his bottom hard, six times for every time you are impertinent. Do you react to that?

I will arrange the camp bill.

Halfwit, I will conclude.

Things to worry about:

Worry about courage
Worry about Cleanliness
Worry about efficiency
Worry about horsemanship
Worry about…

Things not to worry about:

Don’t worry about popular opinion
Don’t worry about dolls
Don’t worry about the past
Don’t worry about the future
Don’t worry about growing up
Don’t worry about anybody getting ahead of you
Don’t worry about triumph
Don’t worry about failure unless it comes through your own fault
Don’t worry about mosquitoes
Don’t worry about flies
Don’t worry about insects in general
Don’t worry about parents
Don’t worry about boys
Don’t worry about disappointments
Don’t worry about pleasures
Don’t worry about satisfactions

Things to think about:

What am I really aiming at?
How good am I really in comparison to my contemporaries in regard to:

(a) Scholarship
(b) Do I really understand about people and am I able to get along with them?
(c) Am I trying to make my body a useful instrument or am I neglecting it?

With dearest love,

Daddy

P.S. My come-back to your calling me Pappy is christening you by the word Egg, which implies that you belong to a very rudimentary state of life and that I could break you up and crack you open at my will and I think it would be a word that would hang on if I ever told it to your contemporaries. “Egg Fitzgerald.” How would you like that to go through life with — “Eggie Fitzgerald” or “Bad Egg Fitzgerald” or any form that might occur to fertile minds? Try it once more and I swear to God I will hang it on you and it will be up to you to shake it off. Why borrow trouble?

Love anyhow.

"Being lost is just an opportunity to find yourself and to define your goals and what you want."

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 12:33:38 +0800

“Being lost is just an opportunity to find yourself and to define your goals and what you want.”

- MVP

This, to me, is what being a Trojan is all about. Gave me the...

Sun, 22 Apr 2012 23:43:23 +0800

This, to me, is what being a Trojan is all about. Gave me the chills seeing this little boy out on our football field, listening to our marching band, wrestling with our players.

Couldn’t be more proud to call USC my alma mater. Fight On!

denisecua: “It’s not about holding doors open or buying nice gifts; not about being active in your...

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:18:31 +0800

denisecua:

“It’s not about holding doors open or buying nice gifts; not about being active in your local church or the ability to throw a compliment my way whenever my bruised ego needs a fix. Those things are wonderful but they’re also the external trappings of fleeting romance.

I want heart and soul – your capacity to extend grace, forgiveness, compassion and, the most endearing quality of all: kindness. A man’s ability to spend and invest his love on everyone, to go above and beyond without prejudice, without any sort of selfish ambition, is probably the only thing I’d actually pray for with intention because of the rarity of its nature. Heart, I believe, is the only real standard. The only thing in the world that truly lasts.”

— Isa Garcia, The Odds of Me Liking You

Word. This reminds me of my grandfather.

P&G and W+K for London 2012. What a brilliant ad, really...

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 23:41:10 +0800

P&G and W+K for London 2012. What a brilliant ad, really love the simple concept and heartening tagline. One of the best parts of working at the Beijing Games was meeting parents after their son/daughter had medalled, and seeing just how proud they were. Let the Games begin.

(My sole gripe is that the Chinese mum doesn’t get to travel to London to see her daughter swim. What’s up with that?! Perhaps Richard Branson and Virgin can sponsor that flight.)

What better place to marvel at the glory of God and his handiwork (via his subcontractors: us) than on the Bund in Shanghai, with the Jetsons-like skyscrapers towering above, or at Montmartre in Paris, with the city’s Gothic glory revealed below.

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 04:47:20 +0800

— Thin Places, Where We Are Jolted Out of Old Ways of Seeing the World, NYT

"The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent."

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 01:30:00 +0800

“The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.”

- Exodus 14:13

"I don’t want to waste my time. To be honest, I don’t want to pursue anyone at all - I just want to..."

Sat, 14 Apr 2012 23:52:36 +0800

“I don’t want to waste my time. To be honest, I don’t want to pursue anyone at all - I just want to be pursued. Maybe it sounds old-fashioned, but that’s just how I feel.”

- Leighton Meester (via ruthle)

Snapped this outside of The National Art Center in Tokyo. Dear...

Sat, 14 Apr 2012 00:08:16 +0800

Snapped this outside of The National Art Center in Tokyo. Dear friend Paul reprocessed and made it infinitely more impressive. Oftentimes things are simply better in black & white.

"And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good."

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:07:31 +0800

“And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.”

- John Steinbeck