rocket science

i didn't know linda was an astronaut until she invited me to her nasa mixer. oh, naasa? i was gonna say, these astronauts are pretty fobby and young. naasa stands for national asian american society of accountsandfinanceprofessionals. i guess naasoaafp wasn't cool. anyhow, linda is somehow involved with the houston chapter - she's not only the president, she's also a member.

i haven't been to one of these professional mixers in a while and wasn't sure what to expect. can't be any worse than the naaap joints i've been to. i've never been to zake before either so i had another reason to go. from the evite alone i could tell that there would be a ton of folks from the big 4 accounting firms: pwc, ey, deloitte, and whoever the last one is. i wrote "afs" on my name tag and louis wrote "talent tree" on his. the plan was that strangers would ask "who is afs?" and we'd have something to talk about. i was wrong, no one gives a shit unless you work for one of the big 3 (since i don't remember the 4th). i would be talking to other folks there and they never asked who afs was. i made a name tag for willie (willie wu - linda's bitch) but he wouldn't wear it. he's so uptight sometimes...

there were some appetizers served, not bad but scarce. i bought trang a lychee martini and i had a different pussy drink - malibu and pineapple. no umbrella tho. zake is a pretty cool looking space. my only other previous experience is seeing some barbie and ken type folks walking out of there and some bubbly blonde said she wasn't wearing panties under her tiny skirt. sweet!

as expected, the crowd was fairly clique-ish. pwc folks here, ey over there, deloitte by the bathroom, and i still don't remember who the last one is. i work with/for none of them and am probably old enough to be their uncles so i mostly hung out with willie and louis. on the way to the appetizer table we made a few friends along the way. the two from boston and beaumont were funny but got all squeamish when willie and i got all friendly like. fucking narrow minded accountants...

i don't blame people for sticking to their little cliques, i've done it plenty myself. you go to a congregation of people, you don't know most of them, of course you're going to stay within your comfort zone and re-hash "laguna beach" and "grey's anatomy" with your buddies. remember, these kids are all doing the same shit but for competitors. reasons why you might leave your circle and mingle with the enemy? you hate your circle. the enemy is hot. her underwear is showing. you want a job with the enemy. you want a reason to never visit shang-HI.

if the goal is to get the crowd to mix, you can't penalize them but perhaps you can create an incentive to do so. say you're raffling off the hottest new pda phone (i don't know what that would be, i'm using a piece of shit motorola razr). you don't get a ticket just for showing up, but you get a ticket when...