No matter who you are, please watch the Leap Day episode of 30 Rock. It's very hilarious. And you'll need to in order to celebrate Leap Day properly. 

If you're not wearing yellow and blue,

My bro may be looking forward to the holiday more than I am:

          "I have already thought about several blue/yellow combos to wear!"
          
          "Def gonna post a leap day related status on fb" 

IDIOT:  I used to have these Chinese bags.
ME:  How do you know they were Chinese?
IDIOT:  I bought them in Chinatown.

You know it's Chinese if you bought it in Chinatown. Just look at all of these Chinese examples.

I don't understand why Idiots feel the need to share things like this with me. I certainly don't conduct my life initiating conversations about being Chinese. I don't find being Chinese-American to be exotic or a novel concept; I've been Chinese-American my whole life. I'm over it. I'm sorry, but the novelty has worn off. 

And what exactly am I supposed to do with this information? Go tell my ancestors?

The bags turned out, in fact, to be Chinese. But I only found out after I Googled it. 

Raise your hand if you've ever felt sick to your stomach after getting together with certain members of your extended family.

(At this moment, my left hand is raised while I am typing this sentence with my right hand fingers.)

We all went to visit my grandmother's tomb stone this weekend for the anniversary of her passing. At the memorial service, the usual distasteful family exchanges took place: primarily, pretentious talk laced with competitiveness. Which is particularly painful for me -not because making life-long comparisons between family members is disgusting behavior- but because they haven't caught on that there is no competition to begin with. They aren't even contenders. I have the biggest ego of them all. That's it. You can't compete with someone who has trouble remembering that she is not in fact J. Lo. 

So I really wish they'd stop trying to convince me that it's about time I get myself an unattractive but rich boyfriend like they've gotten; that they're so productive and on-the-right-track that they "only have time to eat one meal a day" even though my immediate thought after my first glimpse of them at the cemetery was 'Whoa - someone got chunky'; and that I am indeed supposed to be envious of their piles of dirty money. 

Since Qwikster is already not going to happen, those are my 3 wishes, genie.

Of course, not all of them caused me to feel nauseated...

My aunt (who is very young) yelling for her children (my six and eight year-old cousins) who were sitting in the car playing with their NDSes:

"Kids! Time to do the bowing thing!"

(The Chinese light incense and bow facing the tomb stone as a sign of respect for the deceased.)

I’m related to a lot of Chinese people and these are some of the things I’m privy to:

• “Son, don’t wave with your egg roll.”

My 8 year-old cousin usually needs to be told by his parents to say goodbye to relatives who are saying goodbye to him instead of ignoring them. That time, he half-assed his goodbye by waving and not speaking because he was distracted from eating an egg roll. The above-quoted line is the result of such incidence.

• “Why don’t you wear your Doctor Martens today?”

My aunt said that to her husband. Don’t worry, I made sure I laughed at her and had her repeat after me, “Doc Martens” several times.

• “Whitney’s soup 8/9/2011”
  

The day I came across this Post-it note, I developed a fear bigger than my fear of dogs (it’s called cynophobia* and it is very real). It appeared as though Whitney’s soup had been found and, therefore, my blogging purpose was no longer valid. I mean, I started my blog mission on July 2nd – a blog that only lasts 5 weeks? That’s unheard of. Once a blog has begun, it’s meant to last for ages. Surely, I was in disbelief.

I dealt with this newfound anxiety the same way I deal with all my anxiety issues: I emailed/texted a picture of the note to all my friends (another fear I have is that I die without my friends knowing every detail of my day-to-day life [which stems from my other fear of dying, suddenly, at any given moment, as opposed to when I’m averaged to at age 81.58 or from an actual cause of death]) with the subject, “No Joke,” and then panicked, held my breath, eventually breathed out, eventually breathed in, eventually breathed in and out repeatedly, and then before I knew it, it was time for bed. Long story short: Someone pissed me off the next day, giving me something to write about. My blog still serves a purpose.

 * * *

Because I “don’t eat meat,” one of my relatives left this note next to a bowl of soup for me to distinguish from other soup I may come across. Because I “don’t eat meat,” at Thanksgiving, these above-mentioned Chinese people have me sit at “the kids table,” or what is really, “the discriminated table,” which consists of the 2 kids and the anorexic. The note helps remind me that I am distinguished, as I “don’t eat meat.”

I don’t know why the note is dated. Must be a Chinese thing.

_________________________
 *The American Board of Neuro Linguistic Programming defines cynophobia as an anxiety disorder in which one becomes irrationally nervous and uneasy regardless of whether or not the dog presents a legitimate threat.