A Dulin Baby, Uh, I mean Beta

Danny brought Michael and BamBam. I brought Lauren and Bitty. And now we have "Chi-Chi" our newest addition to the Dulin household. He is a bright turquoise beta fish!

My cousin Chi (who the fish is named after) has two in separate bowls or they'd kill each other! (So like males!). At one point I couldn't stand how dirty their water was getting so I cleaned them for her. It was easy and low maintenance. NO fancy fish tank, etc. They breathe by coming up to the surface for air. So easy, so simple!

So last night Danny indulged me and we went to Michael's and I got a large vase, mirror , small vase, and orange, red, and yellow glass pebbles (to match my living room) and VOILA! Beautiful fish bowl! Chi-Chi's blue/green is a nice contrast to the glass pebbles and neither BamBam nor Bitty seemed phased by their new "sibling."

Oh, BTW, update on Bitty: Before our trip she got put on anti-biotics b/c she had a urinary tract infection afterall and seems all better now.

I put the mirror on the bottom and
when he sees his reflection, he gets all riled up
and wants to fight himself!

Dim Sum and Then Some

Danny got to have his first dim sum experience when we went to Chinatown in L.A. If you've never had dim sum, its sorta like a Chinese breakfast version of Spanish tapas. And if you've never had Spanish tapas, well .... you need to get out more. Anyway, this experience has wayyyyy too much shrimp for me although we enjoyed the fried squid (almost like calamari) very much.

The last time I had dim sum musta been about 15 years ago. And I think I'll wait another 15 before I do it again!

A Lucky Citrus Situation

My cousin has a lemon tree and an orange tree in her backyard. This year for some reason, the two trees swapped in what would be normal sizes for their fruits. The oranges were small and the lemons were the size of large oranges if not small grapefruits! I have never seen such big lemons!

In any case, the lemons did indeed make for delicious fresh squeezed lemonade which we enjoyed very much.

On Tet, Danny went out to pick some oranges which turned out to be sweet and juicy. Later when my aunt arrived, she said "What good luck! You are suppose to pick ripe fruit on new year's day and if it is sweet it means more luck. And because Danny didn't know this, this means MORE luck! Danny you bring us luck!"

That is the running theme: LUCK. It was interesting to be around this kind of belief: A little bit of God, a little bit of ancestor worship, a little bit of Virgin Mary and of course a little bit but hopefully a lotta bit of luck on Tet. It was all very Amy Tan.

For Danny and I, we walked a fine line of respectful blessing and thanking God, but joking that I was what brought the luck, because well....... I'm the Princess!

"Migrant" worker Danny



Danny got to pick, and I got to peel.

My cousin with Binky and BooBoo

I confess, I got attached to Binky and
it made missing BamBam easier.