Pick A Side! (First Vlog)

The Grilled Cheese Truck

What Is This?
These are pictures of The Grilled Cheese Truck on the UCLA campus.

Hate It Or Love It?
Don't you love it when you take a risk with where you eat and it pays off?

I walked out of Boelter Hall at 1PM today and my stomach felt like it was eating itself. That's what skipping out on breakfast will do to you. Anyways, I had two options for food at that point: go back to De Neve dining hall and eat the same food I've been eating for the past 8 months or try one of the food trucks parked in the South Campus courtyard.

A quick note about these food trucks: there are a lot of trucks that drive around L.A. and sell unique, fusion food. They're kind of hit (like the Kogi truck. Wow.) or miss. But either way, your tastebuds are in for an experience.

Inspired by Chanel's recents posts about food trucks and determined to take a look at the flipside of a coin that I had touched on earlier, I decided on the trucks. The Grilled Cheese Truck, in particular. Hey, if you're going to try something new, might as well try the most unique sounding one, right?

I stood in line for 45 minutes waiting for a damn grilled cheese sandwich and I didn't think my growling stomach would forgive me. Until I bit into the "Fully Loaded" (complete with macaroni and cheese, barbeque pork and carmelized onions). Who knew reliving a childhood favorite with a twist could be so rewarding?

Wasting Ink and Killing Trees

What Is This?
This is the machine that deprives me from some much-needed sleep and gives me headaches instead.

Hate It Or Love It?
Don't you hate it when your printer cuts off what you're trying to print out and you end up with two pages: one with almost the full contents and one that only has 1/50th of the page filled up?

I could do ten different hate it's about printers alone. I've thought about chucking my printer out of my 6th floor window on more than a couple occasions. But I'll save my thoughts about those issues for a different day.

Earlier this week I needed to print out my Physics 4AL lab report at 3AM the night before it was due. And of course, there's the rule that if you leave something to the last minute, things will go wrong. Anyways, I tried fitting my Excel data tables onto one page but when I try to print, the printer cut off one column of my table (sometimes I fail to notice that there's a second page if I scroll down on my print preview). I'm left with two pages: one with almost all the columns and one with only one column. Printing multiple pages and being able to use zero is frustrating, especially at three in the morning.

With all these high-tech features on phones, cameras and computers, shouldn't printers at least have some function that checks if almost all of a second page is blank and automatically compresses the contents onto one page if it is? Or at least gives you the option to? Engineers at H.P., that means you.

A Random Act Of Kindness

What Is This?
This is the inside of the train that I was on. It almost looked like a crowded city bus because people had to stand in the aisle due to lack of seats.

Hate It Or Love It?
Don't you love the infectiousness of a random act of kindness?

So here's the story: I was on a completely full Amtrak and a good amount of passengers had to stand in the aisle. A middle-aged man commuting home from work noticed a woman with a lot of luggage standing in the aisle. While most people were still arguing over the remaining seats, he stood up, offered his seat and then helped her store her luggage.

Due to pressures in each of our lives, we tend to go through our days a little bit on edge. We don't focus on the good things because they're supposed to go right. We only focus on what's wrong. And trust me, if you're human (which most of us are), things will go wrong during your day.

Sometimes these little setbacks during our day will lead to a shortened temper. And this shortened temper can translate into outbursts that bring down other people and ruin their day as well. You're more likely to see an act of rudeness or frustration than an act of courtesy. Case in point: while on the bus ride to the train station, a driver clipped the side of a parked car and left the sideview mirror bent out of shape. The decent thing to do would be to stop and leave a note, at the very least. But no. This guy just sped away without looking back.

Just as a bad temper is infectious, even one kind act can be infectious as well. After watching the man on the train give up his seat, I was inspired to brighten someone else's day. I ended up helping an old lady fix her umbrella and lending my phone to someone who was lost so that he could call a friend. I'm not saying I normally wouldn't do these things. I'm just saying that maybe we should all be a little more aware of how we can brighten another person's day with a simple action.

It's evidence that you don't have to donate a billion dollars to starving children in Africa to make a big difference. It's as easy as giving up a seat on a train.

On a related note, take some time to watch the movie "Crash" if you haven't already. It's a great movie and the whole plot revolves around this general idea.

Face Paint

What Is This?
This is me gearing up to go paintballing for the first time.

Hate It Or Love It?
Don't you hate it when you see something bad that's about to happen but don't have enough time to react?

We're five minutes into one of our rounds and I'm taking cover behind a wall. All of a sudden, I hear a series of splatters on the wall to my side. I turn to my left and all I see is a stream of paintballs headed straight for my head and chest. This is no hero's story. You already know how it ends. Painfully.

Every day, there are moments when you see something bad that's about to happen. A drink is about to fall on the floor or your door is about to close behind you and you don't have the key. In that split second, you wish you could react but you're helpless. It's like a movie playing in slow motion. All you can do is watch.

Bonus Picture (that's NOT me, thankfully):

Bruise from a paintball

Hi, My Name Is...

What Is This?
This is a dinner hosted by the club Epic. It was kind of an informational thing where you meet other new people interested in the club.

Hate It Or Love It?
Don't you hate it when you meet someone and forget their name five minutes later?

"Hi, my name's Bryan"
"Hey Bryan, I'm Karina"
"Nice to meet you"
"Nice to meet you too"

If you replace "Karina" with another name, that conversation probably happened at least ten times during the dinner. Problem is, once you get introduced to a new person, you forget the name of the person you met three people ago. So when the time comes to ask Katherine (or was it Katrina?) to pass a napkin, I don't know what to say. In these situations, I usually just resort to "Hey...HEY...mind passing the napkins?" Yes, a little impersonal and somewhat rude, but its better than calling her by the wrong name. Yes, I've done that before. And yes, that's a whole lot more embarrassing (don't you REALLY hate it when?).