Tomorrow marks the beginning of Lent and, being the good Catholic girl that I am, I’ll be giving up some things and making some promises. I’ve decided to use this year’s Lenten season as an opportunity for change. Yeah, yeah… I can barely keep up with my New Years Resolutions. But I have to believe that I can spend the next forty days living a little better and improving myself–cuz if I don’t, I’m gonna go to hell. Aw, just kidding! I think…

It’s pretty difficult to give up things like rice, meat, or coffee (though I did successfully give up coffee one year), so I’ve decided to give up deep fried food this year. It may seem easy, but I ate bacon, a donut, and fries today without thinking anything of it. I’m also going to give up pop, but that’s a pretty easy one. Other things I thought about giving up but know that I can’t: swearing, drinking, Twitter, chocolate. Actually, I probably could give up chocolate. We’ll see.

I’ve also decided to add positive things in my life along with shedding some of the negative. I promise to eat fruit everyday, except the days that I’m fasting. I kept a food diary for awhile and actually went a whole month without eating fruit, so this isn’t as easy as it sounds. I’ve also been exceptionally lazy lately, and with that laziness comes some guilt, so I’m promising to accomplish something, big or small, each day. I’ll record my accomplishments in my journal.

So, there you go. Lent 2010. Now excuse me while I stuff my face with junk food. I’ve only got five more hours to enjoy Fat Tuesday.

Hi. My name is Lisa and I’m allergic to alcohol.

What. The. Fuck.

As is typical of many Asians, my face gets red and hot when I drink. My close friends and relatives especially love pointing out how red my ears get. I’ve noticed as I’ve gotten older that something else happens when I drink. My nose gets stuffed up and I have sneezing fits. As you can imagine, these things make a buzzed Lisa very sexy.

I didn’t refer to it as an allergy until I mentioned it to one of my cousins, and she noted that she had the same reaction to alcohol. We started doing Internet research on alcohol allergies. The scariest thing that we stumbled upon was that alcohol allergies in people of Asian ethnicity may be a risk factor for certain types of cancer (too lazy to look up the reference right now).

I’m not a big drinker. It doesn’t take much for the allergic reactions to occur. They’re more of a nuisance than anything else. I’ve never reached a point where I couldn’t breathe or where my airway closed up. I have puked from drinking before, but there’s no pattern… it can be after two drinks or five. It can be from drinking after eating sushi or a steak dinner.

I’m a little buzzed right now. I’ve sneezed about 37 times and blown my nose three times. It’s annoying and I’m a total mouth breather right now. Hmm. Maybe I should stop drinking.

It was last year. January 21, 2009. I was bored to death. I was at the hospital, in the maternity ward, waiting for my sister to have her baby. To pass the time, I decided to do something completely cheesy:

I started writing a letter to my unborn niece.

I wrote about what I was doing (watching LOST) and what was going on in the world. I told her about her family. I told her about all the things I was hoping to share with her as she grew up. Finally, I made a promise to write her a letter every year on her birthday. In addition, I would create a CD with the Top 10 singles (according to Billboard) the week of each birthday. I promised to do the same for her older sister, even though I missed doing it the first 3 birthdays  and her actual birth date.

I’m the youngest in my family and youngest among the extended family I grew up with. When my older niece was born, I was fascinated with watching her grow up. I’d never been there and aware when someone was learning how to crawl, walk, or speak. It’s amazing to witness. I’m hoping to be able to communicate to my nieces what that feeling is like in the letters I write to them.

It’s a little corny. But it’s something I would have liked to have. I just hope that as the years go by, the CDs I make for my nieces will have artists other than Black Eyed Peas and Miley Cyrus on them.