A couple friend of ours who relocated to northern California last year are in town this week for work, and so they invited themselves (well, they knew we’d agree if we were also in town) over for Sunday brunch. I got excited since we haven’t seen them in about a year since they relocated to Sacramento, but I also got excited because it meant I’d have another opportunity to try out some new recipes. Since I got my Instant Pot, I knew I wanted to test out the “yogurt” incubator mode to make dosa/idli batter. Dosa and idli are made from the exact same fermented batter; the only difference is that the idli batter is the fermented batter as it is once it’s finished rising, while the dosa batter is idli batter that is thinned out with water. This helps with getting it nice and crispy when you fry it on a pan to make a super thin crepe. Dosa batter, traditionally, doesn’t use any real learners like yeast or baking soda; it relies completely on the fermentation coming from the urad dal lentils, rice, and methi seeds. This failed the last time I tried it last year, and the batter never rose, and I had thick crappy pancakes to eat for a whole week because I didn’t want to throw out the batter (wasted food is the enemy in my house). So, I don’t know if it’s the problem of the air in this apartment or what, but I’m hoping the Instant Pot incubating mode can resolve my worries.

I took one of my customers out to lunch today, and one of the members of the team is planning a two-week-long vacation to Japan, visiting multiple cities both urban and in the countryside. I asked him where he was going, and given his interests, I suggested he add Hiroshima to the list. It’s strange to me to hear about Americans visiting Japan, some multiple times, and never expressing any desire to go to Hiroshima, the city that this country decided to flatten and decimate within seconds at the end of World War II. I don’t want to be openly judgmental about it, but I try to be effusive when I recommend it from a historical and empathetic perspective. Don’t we as Americans have a responsibility to know what we did to this group of innocent people during one of the major world wars? And aside from that, Hiroshima is a beautiful city with Miyajima Island, a beautiful half- or full-day trip away, as well as the delicious local oysters and okonomiyaki. To me, it’s a win-win to add this city to one’s Japan itinerary.

I gave him my 2-minute pitch, and at the end of it, he said, “I’m sold. Send me all your recommendations there, and I’ll retinker my itinerary.”

That’s what I can sell without even trying: food and and travel.

I went out to Forest Hills today to attend a friend’s housewarming party/baby shower. Since Chris is traveling internationally, I went on my own. And I’d never really felt more unattached than when I showed up at this party, where literally everyone, with the exception of the host’s two single friends, his mother, and his grandmother, were all paired up. I’m generally a social and outgoing person, but at this party, pretty much no one wanted to talk to me because everyone seemed to be glued at the hip to their plus-one/boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife. The people who ended up talking to me were 1) the host obviously and 2) the two single male friends who came. One of the friends was familiar to me since I met him the last time I came to this friend’s house for a dinner, and so he ended up latching onto me, for better or for worse. We clearly had very little in common, so it was a nice break when the second male friend arrived and could change up the conversation topics. I got asked a few times where my husband was… not because anyone knew Chris, but because they saw the wedding band/engagement rings on my left hand. Go figure that everyone is going to want to size me up to some degree.

I don’t really think about being married that often in a social context because…. I suppose I’ve never really had to think about it. Chris and I are not the couple who attends an event and cannot be separated. In fact, we tend to break off pretty often, and sometimes it seems like he’s just more social when I am not there. But I could tell that the host’s friend who latched onto me was very cognizant of being single in a party where pretty much everyone was paired off. And I’m sure it made him feel self-conscious and perhaps even made him question his self-worth.

We don’t really live in a society that’s progressive enough to not judge people who are single by their early- to mid-30s sadly. I wish it didn’t have to be this way. But we live in a judgmental world. Just because someone is dating someone or married to someone doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s a better person or more “put together” than someone who is not paired off. I don’t think I will live to see the day when this is not a measure we have to hold ourselves against.

My dad is not the kind of person who shows his emotions. He’s the stereotypical Asian male, the one who is usually stoic, sticks with the facts and the tasks at hand and never tries to enter the realm of feelings and inner thoughts.

I sent him this article from the New York Times about a successful woman who experienced her own stroke quite young, the same article I wrote about last week. I said to him over email, hey, sometimes, even when you think you are healthy and are doing the right thing, things happen, and you need to treat them with urgency.

He replied back with something along the lines of, “Luke Perry’s situation was probably more complicated than that. He was likely on drugs!”

I responded, eh. Should we really be that quick to assume drugs were responsible for this? I’m not fully sure?

My dad’s last response to me on this via email: Even if you think you are healthy because you’re eating relatively healthily and exercising regularly, if you work in an office full of politics and have a stressful work life, then you aren’t healthy!

I stared at that short and sweet email for a while. He’s basically saying to me… that that is my life. That’s probably Chris’s life.

Then, I thought about all those times my dad has always said that working for someone else is always going to be terrible because you are at the beck and call of someone else. You are constantly serving someone else and not yourself, that the best way to live is to work for oneself because you can run your life the way you want it and don’t have to answer to anyone.

Before I left to go back to New York on this last trip home, he said, “Remember to take care of yourself,” with a stern voice. My dad worries about me. I know he does because my mom always tells me that he wonders if I am getting enough sleep or am stressed out from work… because they know I would never tell them if it was bad.

My dad is right, though. Working for someone else really does suck… especially when you have officially gotten recognized for being a top performer and are not rewarded proportionally for it.