Impromptu Collisions in San Francisco

Posted on by Elise
one of the co-living homes i'm featuring in an upcoming npr story.
One of the co-living homes I’m featuring in an upcoming NPR story.

Most of my favorite collisions with people come with less than an hour’s notice. That kept happening in San Francisco — a mark of my similarly last-minute friends, and maybe the ethos of the Bay area. I shall award my trip various arbitrary points, below:

+500 This view (from previous post) will never get old.

+60 The purpose of the trip was reporting for our upcoming Bay Area theme week and to attend the TED Women conference. Both went really well.

why were our ted badges the size of our faces? (with guy raz.)
Why were our TED badges the size of our faces? (With Guy Raz.)

+50 When I landed at SFO on Wednesday, I saw on Foursquare that fellow Texas Tribune original gangsta H.O. Maycotte was in San Fran, too. Thank you, Foursquare, for the “people nearby” filter. We met for lunch 30 minutes later in the Ferry Building, right on the water.

raina's sweet boy.
Raina’s sweet boy.

+ 20 Gal pal Raina and I ran into each other in the lobby of the Jazz Center where the conference was happening. She’s a new mom of a seven-week-old, and her darling, delicious baby was with her. I got to babysit so she had a minute to go to the bathroom. I mainly just stared at him and took pictures.

+75 Impromptu lunch with another gal pal from the Knight Foundation super-friends circuit, Kara Oehler! My producer on the communal living story, Cindy, happened to be Kara’s mentor from more than a decade ago. Kara also used to babysit Cindy’s kids. We three were able to do a delicious lunch at a french cafe in Lower Haight. Love those gals.

+35 Sneaking in some real bonding time with my digital news coworker Dana, who I’ve worked with for years but never spent any social time with. She invited me to join her at TED Women in the first place. We had a swell time getting beers together on opening night.

+ 10 I met interior designer Elizabeth “Beth” Martin while she was freshening up all the fresh flowers in Friend Matt’s condo. She offered a flower arranging tip since I asked — Don’t be too matchy. Soft flowers like peonies and roses should absolutely be paired with woodsy choices.

the amazing japanese toilet that both excited and confounded me.
The amazing Japanese toilet that both excited and confounded me.

+1,600  Japanese toilets. Thank you, Mr. Toto, wherever you are, for your seat warming, automatic lid-raising technology.

-400 I was too scared to try any of the rear or front washes, and don’t even know what it is that oscillates or pulsates, but I dig having all the options.

best night of the week was with brother-from-another-mother, dave. i found him in the twitter cafeteria.
Best night of the week was with brother-from-another-mother, Dave. I found him in the Twitter cafeteria.

+100 I dropped in on Twitter HQ with 30 minutes notice and didn’t text my brother-from-another-mother Dave to tell him I was in his building until I was actually sititng in “The Perch,” er, Twitter’s cafeteria. That resulted in a quick lunch room gab fest until we met up again for happy hour, during which Dave introduced me and my pal and colleague, host Guy Raz to The Hot Spot, a divey dive dive bar that serves a smooth shot and a beer with a scratch-off ticket. Guy actually won another ticket, only to lose on his second try. Maybe it’s a trap?

-25 Due to too many shot-beer-scratcher combos, we ended up drinking and eating at a random bowling place in the Mission (after first attempting and bailing on a sketchy food place that smelled of urine) and stayed out too late for me to watch Scandal on Matt’s new 4K TV.

matt was kind enough to update his new tv for scandal, but none of us made it home in time to watch it.
Matt was kind enough to update his new TV for Scandal, but none of us made it home in time to watch it.

+5 The television is now updated.

my best friend from high school in plano, texas, erin, is 9 months pregnant. so excited.
My best friend from high school in Plano, Texas, Erin, is 9 months pregnant. So excited.

No points, just saying: There were white dudes everywhere. The ratio of men to women seemed to really favor women, at least everywhere I was at. I felt outnumbered by groups of men at breakfast, at bars, everywhere except the TED conference for women.

+500 Reunion with my bestie best best friend from high school, Erin Baudo, four weeks before her due date. I’m so psyched for her little bruiser.

+30 Erin let me nurse my hangover with breakfast at the Zynga cafeteria, where she works.

+50 The three-man NPR tech reporting team — Steve Henn, Laura Sydell and myself — got together in person in one place for the first time. We hung out at member station KQED and got some delicious coffee.

+30 A nice afternoon walk with Code for America’s Catherine Bracy.

+45 Sneaking away during TED lunch hour to shop in Hayes Valley with my pal Tina. Stopped in Chantal Guillion to sample their signature French macarons, had them shipped to a girlfriend in Texas. Should get there Monday.

+24 Pre-gaming one evening with a new friend from the 2013 collection — another Matt — Matt Wilson.

-10 Having to squeeze in so much in four days felt a little too intense.

 +5000 Seeing my favorite toddler this morning after being away from her for almost a week. Swoon.

Happy 15th Birthday, Saidee

Posted on by Elise
my momma's beagle.
My momma’s beagle.

For all my Texas pride, Saidee’s the only member of the Hu family that is a living, breathing Texas native. She was born in Grand Prairie, the runt of the litter. I remember her dog father being a show dog named “Copper Mountain Cody” — all the official AKC show dogs in her lineage were named by the street they called home.

I was a junior in high school at the time and, knowing I’d be leaving home for college the next year, scoured the classifieds to find a puppy daughter for my dog-loving mom. We hadn’t had a dog in our house since the unfortunate and painful hit-and-run death of my cocker spaniel, when I was 12.

My best friend Erin helped me choose Saidee — we drove out to Grand Prairie in my red Jeep Cherokee and visited the litter, which included three boisterous boys and one girl who seemed to struggle getting to feed as much as her brothers. She also had more brown in her coloring and an identifiable spot, so I picked her out and called dibs until she was old enough to come home. I snuck her into the house in my coat pocket — it was Christmas-time, 15 years ago — and presented her to my mom later that night.

We all fell in love. Saidee lived with my parents until my mom was transferred abroad, at which point she lived with my brother Roger and his then-girlfriend Tracy, in Tucson. She moved in with me and Matty in 2007 and has been with us ever since. In her 15 years, she’s lived in four states, survived a cancer scare, ran away and returned at least five times*, moved across the country by plane and car half a dozen times, explored the nation’s monuments, trekked through the Appalachian mountains, eaten everything that she shouldn’t have, put up with a total of four cats and now, a toddler.

When I got Saidee, I was a girl. Now I have a little girl of my own. We truly grew up together. I don’t mean this to diminish parenting a human in any way, but so much of my confidence as a momma came from learning how to really relate with Saidee and meet her needs over these past 15 years.

Now that she’s 15, she spends most of her days sleeping, has gone deaf in both her ears and is vision impaired, too. But she’s still spirited and spry — getting hyper and running around in circles when we come home, rolling around on her back for belly rubs, tirelessly rearranging herself in bed in order to snag the perfect spot, which somehow always seems to take up a lot more space than her 23 lb body would let on.

Happy Birthday, Saidee. I love you.

*In the most ridiculous Saidee runaway story, Saidee ran away to the home of another Asian-American woman in St. Louis, where she was living at the time. The woman renamed her “DuDu Peng” for the days they were together. I only know this because she took Saidee to the vet for her lifelong affliction with skin allergies, and got a prescription. My dad only tracked down Saidee because he was out at an intersection putting up Lost signs and across the street, his friend spotted “Found” signs showing Saidee/Dudu’s image.

Thanksgiving 2013

Posted on by Elise

I’m always thankful for family, and mine is particularly badass partly because it’s huge and includes a lot of foodies and eaters. So Thanksgiving with my extended family in Maryland always involves a lot of serious eating but it’s really more like a giant face-stuffing scrum than it is a “lunch” or a “dinner.” Part of the reason is because we have about 30 family members plus kids involved each year, so we don’t sit around one giant table, and we eat in phases starting at the lunch hour but powering on through til dinner. It generally includes our hyper-physical four-year-old cousin Luc beating and wailing on Stiles for a good chunk of time, and Cousin Clarence reliably brings Turducken — the Louisiana favorite involving a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey. (Note: My cousins the Ho brothers enjoy some cult fame in a tiny corner of the Star Wars and kung fu choreography-loving internet for their 2002 fight video, Art of the Saber. True story.)

Our meat selections felt endless — Suk, my cousin’s wife Diem’s sister’s husband — got himself a smoker and making brisket has become a new hobby of his. So on top of two fried turkeys, the Turducken, a ham and endless sides, we had two choices of brisket — spicy and sweet. Our pals Audrey and Patrick have spent so much time flying back and forth to family this year that they stayed in town for Turkey Day, so they joined us at the Maryland festival of meat, armed with Audrey’s signature brussel sprout salad, which disappeared quickly. Gobble, gobble.

audrey brought her specialty from her texas momma's recipe — brussel sprout salad.
Audrey brought her specialty from her Texas momma’s recipe — brussel sprout salad.
the turducken (foreground) and one of our turkeys.
The turducken (foreground) and one of our turkeys.
cousin cary goofing off with toddler eva.
Cousin Cary goofing off with toddler Eva.
part of our feast included a counter of asian food — chinese, vietnamese and korean to represent all the asian types in our family. so eva dutifully ate from chopsticks.
Part of our feast included a counter of Asian food — Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean to represent all the Asian types in our family. So Eva dutifully ate from chopsticks.
one side of the kitchen was just for sides.
One side of the kitchen was just for sides.
with the newlywed texas pals patrick and audrey, who we brought along.
With the newlywed Texas pals Patrick and Audrey, who we brought along.

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A New Theme

Posted on by Elise

Last week I learned WordPress now has photo and quote post types, like Tumblr does. The post types are a huge draw for me as a sometimes-Tumblr user, but I am partial to WordPress for all the flexibility it offers. So I loaded up a new theme so that I can take advantage of post types, and I hope to be testing them out with random photos, quotes and multimedia posts in the coming weeks. Things could be glitchy for a bit, but nothing on the scale of HealthCare.gov’s disaster, which has basically consumed my past two months.

Best Day Ever

Posted on by Elise

I say “best day ever” about many days, which then undermines all the other “best day” claims, but Thursday was pretty sweet. I hopped on a train to New York for a Grist Magazine benefit in the evening. But just before leaving, I learned Rob and Phoebe (my favorite live musicians I actually know in real life) from the sadly-split Austin-band The Belleville Outfit were playing a little stage in Soho during happy hour. Lucky for me, I was hanging out in the neighborhood with Friend Matt anyhow, so I got to bring him and his gal pal along for the show. Serendipity rocks. Hearing Rob’s new stuff was a delight.

rob and phoebe from the belleville outfit play a tiny stage in new york.
Rob and Phoebe from The Belleville Outfit play a tiny stage in New York.

The night got better. One of my bucket list items in life is to hang out for a day with comedian David Cross, but IN CHARACTER AS Tobias Fünke. That did not happen. But I got closer — Rob came along to the Grist benefit and we got to laugh uproariously to the comic stylings of Eugene Mirman, Wyatt Cenac and David Cross as David Cross. So I got to meet him afterward. Here we are hanging on the couch. #Psyched!

oh, no big deal, just hanging out on a couch with david cross. (and eugene!)
Oh, no big deal, just hanging out on a couch with DAVID CROSS. (And Eugene!)

One Year Old Milestones, Courtesy Of My Clever Colleague

Posted on by Elise

I started worrying this weekend that my 13 month old daughter, Eva, was developmentally behind because she’s not as verbal as I was when I was a baby. I started calling my mom “mama” and meaning it at 10 months. Eva is going to be 14 months and still doesn’t do it. She knows only one word — light, in Mandarin. So I’ve been harping about this all day to my friends and colleagues, and my science correspondent friend Geoff, in an effort to poke fun at me and tell me to chill out, sent me this “list” of “milestones.”

Your Child at One Year

Check the milestones your child has reached by his or her 1st birthday. Take this with you and talk with your child’s doctor at every visit about the milestones your child has reached and what to expect next.

What most children do at this age:

Social and Emotional

·         Puts out arm or leg to help with dressing

·         Plays games such as “peek-a-boo” and “pat-a-cake”

·         Shows existential dread

·         Reads you a book when he wants to hear a story

·         Can solve some multivariate algebraic expressions

Language/Communication

·         Responds to iambic pentameter

·         Basic grasp of American Sign Language

·         Says “mama” and “dada” and exclamations like “All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.”

·         Tries to say words you say

 Cognitive (learning, thinking, problem-solving)

·         Explores things in different ways, like shaking, banging, throwing

·         Able to replace a manifold gasket and/or ignition coils on most late model cars.

Okay, I get it. I’m obsessing about something that I probably have nothing to worry about. At least I hope not.

The Asian Reporters All Look And Sound Alike Problem

Posted on by Elise

The disastrous rollout of HealthCare.gov is a technology implementation story in a big way, so I’ve basically been under water at work ever since Oct 1. Since it’s a huge story that encompasses many of our beats, it means that I’m working more closely with the Washington desk, which is where my fellow Asian NPR reporter, Ailsa Chang works.

Ever since Ailsa started covering Capitol Hill, my co-workers began complimenting me for HER great reporting. Whoops. Part of the problem is our names — Ailsa is pronounced “EL-sa” and Elise, well, has the same sounds. The other issue is likely that we’re the two Chinese-American gals who cover sometimes overlapping topics.

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Matty created a poster for my desk as a guide. And yesterday when we were both on the Hill we took a pic together to help people out on social media:

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But after all my public service announcing, I came back from the Hill only to get an email from an admin guy saying “You have an interoffice mail on Beth’s desk.” I rushed over to Beth’s desk, since I love getting mail, only to find it was addressed to Ailsa, not me.

/facepalm.