Cindy Agoncillo Blog, Dream Journal

Dream Journal: Phil and the Fangirls

Lately I’ve been struggling to get going in the morning. I usually wake up at least an hour after my alarm clock goes off. This morning, I woke up relatively early and surprisingly well rested. I credit this feeling to the dream I had last night – and going to bed before 2 AM for once this week.

In my dream, I had sent Philip Wang (of Wong Fu Productions) a message via either Twitter or Facebook. He sent a hand-written reply on what looked like green elastic medical tape. Soon after I received his reply, I came across him in person. He remembered me from my online message, and we began talking. Though I don’t remember what my message said, he thanked me for it. It had apparently left an impression on him – enough for him to remember my name and face.

We talked for some time about my message and just about life in general. He also mentioned that he was looking to move into a new apartment. Jokingly, I offered to let him move in with me, and shockingly he seemed to be interested in the offer. “My roommate is going to be moving out in a few months anyway…” I explained.

“You have a roommate?” he asked, somewhat surprised. He continued thinking about the offer and went on to explain that he had been thinking about moving east. “I’m actually from Cincinnati,” he said. Living in California, he spent so much time away from his family and wanted to live closer to them.

At this point, we were interrupted by an airline representative who asked to see our boarding passes. Apparently we had been in an airport gate the whole time. Our passes looked slightly different, but they were for the same flight. We were both in row 8, I think. For some reason, I was a little concerned that the woman would think we were together, perhaps even married, because our seats were next to each other. Soon after the woman left, a teenage girl with a pink bedazzled Blackberry came up to us – well, up to Phil. As she asked for his phone number between nervous giggles, I remember feeling proud of myself for holding a mature conversation with Phil without getting all fan-girly (much like how I felt during their Princeton visit last April when Phil and I briefly talked about The Office).

Normally, after such a pleasant dream, I would resist waking up. However, this dream was so relatively realistic and… comfortable. I woke up without much issue, because it felt like I would wake up to find that my dream was actually reality – and if that were the case, I’d want to wake up as soon as possible.

And now I just sound like a giggly fangirl.

Phil and I at Wong Fu’s Princeton event – a girl can dream, can’t she?
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Cindy Agoncillo Blog, Dream Journal

Dream Journal: “I Miss Wes”

I don’t remember exactly how all these events were connected in my dream, but these are the details I remember.

  • I was a part of Wong Fu Productions, but I was still in that awkward new person phase. It was the phase where I had Philip Wang’s cell number and could text him, but I wasn’t sure if he would want me to text or if he even had my number saved.
  • Perhaps I was part of Wong Fu to replace Wes, who had somehow died. One of the guys had made a memorial video of Wes. I wept while watching, and at the end said, “I miss Wes.”
  • I was taking dry, brown leaves and coloring them green with markers. I think I was doing this as part of a gift for my “sister” who was having a baby. (I really do have a sister, but she was not the person in my dream, nor is she having a baby.) She was at the hospital having the baby, and I drove with someone to see her. I was the one driving, and I turned left instead of turning right. I think I was planning to go somewhere along the way, but then I realized I was just driving horribly out of the way. I thought about texting Phil to let him know I would be late to school because my sister was having a baby, but then I wasn’t sure if he wanted to receive my text message.

12/26/11 – I just remembered another detail! Somewhere in there, I was playing guitar with Paul Wright. At first, a friend and I were trying to play one of Paul’s songs, and he just happened to be there. Not wanting to show Paul that I didn’t really know how to play his song, we started playing a mashup of songs using the only three chords I knew in the dream. I’m pretty sure one of the songs was “She Will Be Loved” by Maroon 5.

Cindy Agoncillo Blog

How Did You Find Me?

Whenever I log into WordPress and check the stats on my website, I am often amused by what I find – especially the search terms that somehow led someone to my site. Two questions usually come to mind. 1 – Why was someone searching for that? 2 – How did that Google search lead someone to my site?

Here are some of the search terms I find most amusing and somewhat confusing…

Nathan Fillion
Someone once searched for “no a tv show i used to love,” a quote from Castle that references Firefly, a well-loved and prematurely canceled Nathan Fillion TV show. However, the sixth most popular search term for my site, “Nathan Fillion shirtless” is both amusing and confusing. I like that someone was actually searching for this, and probably was very disappointed when they landed on a blog/design gallery. It took me a while to realize they did a Google Image search and clicked on a picture of a shirtless Harry Shum, Jr., which I had included on my wishlist page. Sorry, folks. No shirtless Nathan Fillion here.

Wong Fu Productions
I met the guys of Wong Fu (Philip Wang, Wesley Chan, and Ted Fu) in April, and since then, people have ended up on my site after various Google searches related to them. According to the stats, “Wesley Chan” is even more popular than shirtless Nathan Fillion, coming in as the 4th most popular search term of all time. “Wong Fu Productions” and “Ted Fu” come in 7th and 8th, respectively. Sadly, “Philip Wang,” my favorite of the three, is only 19th on the list. However, one person did search for “Philip Wang Wong Fu Productions shirtless,” if that makes you feel any better. People have also searched for more specific items, like Wesley Chan’s resume or information about Wong Fu’s new office in Pasadena. The most amusing Wong Fu-related search, though, has got to be “Cindy from Wong Fu Productions.” I don’t know if they were looking for me, but I’ll gladly accept the title.

Kina Grannis
Phil, Wes, and Ted weren’t the only YouTubers I met in April. The day after seeing Wong Fu in Princeton, I met Kina Grannis in Philadelphia. “Kina Grannis” is actually the #1 search term for my site. With 70 hits just for Kina’s name, there weren’t too many other related searches. Several people searched for Kina’s braid while two people wanted to know what her favorite store is. Other people wanted information about buying a signed frame from Kina’s “Valentine” music video, an item I received as part of the Stairwells deluxe package. One person searched for “Kina Grannis song for her mom,” which was part of the Project 4 Awesome campaign, something I personally thanked Kina for doing. My favorite Kina search is “Cindy Agoncillo Kina Grannis.” Whoever Googled this – I have no idea who you are or why you were searching for me and Kina, but you’re awesome.

Glee
I’ve written a few blog posts about the TV show Glee, but I’ve also included specific mentions of Harry Shum, Jr., one of the show’s stars who also happens to follow me on Twitter. Many of the Glee-related searches are incredibly amusing. People either want to find out about the characters or the personal lives of the show’s stars. “Does Jenna Ushkowitz smoke?” “Chord Overstreet virginity.” “Harry Shum Jr. braids.” “Meaning of Glee quote ‘I looked under the bed…'” “What Glee characters are virgins?” “Chord Overstreet drinking.” “Harry Shum Jr smokes.” “Is Harry Shum Jr religious?” “So ‘woof’ on Prop 15 meaning.” “Harry Shum Jr is he half.” What answers were people expecting to find on my site?

Adele
I wrote a review of Adele’s new album, 21, after I received a copy from my roommate. My review included a transcript from Adele’s video of “Someone Like You,” in which she tells a story of the song’s inspiration. My search term stats are riddled with numerous combinations of words and phrases from this video as people try to figure out exactly what Adele is saying. It’s not exactly easy to figure out what she’s saying in the video, and I can’t even guarantee that people are finding an accurate transcript on my site. Not everyone was looking for an accurate transcript, though. One person wanted to know if Adele had been left at the altar, and another person asked, “Why are Adele’s songs so sad?”

Single Adulthood/Biblical Manhood and Womanhood
I’ve written a few posts about being a single adult, and I wrote a few more about biblical manhood and womanhood in response to a series of discussions my church’s young adult group has been having on the topic. I’m not surprised that these search terms ended up on my site, but I am intrigued that someone (other than me) is actually searching for this topic. Some of the search terms include “what is singleness,” “singleness struggles,” “single in the church,” “woman was created from the rib of man,” “redefining singlehood,” “biblical womanhood,” single woman dreading engagement ring blog,” “complementarian women in the workforce,” “John Piper, a woman with a male secretary,” “singleness bitterness,” “50s cake mom,” “do christian men prefer the complementarian view or the egalitarian view in church leadership positions,” and my favorite: “woman make me a sandwich.”

Random
– “Superman” – I have a photo of Superman in my gallery, but I can’t begin to imagine how many pages of search results those people had to click through until they got to my photo.

– Anything with “Cindy Agoncillo” in it – It’s fairly obvious how searching for my name would lead a person to my site, but I’m more interested in knowing exactly who is searching for me! Even searches with “Cindy” in it make me wonder if someone was searching for me specifically. When someone Googled “Asian Cindy YouTube,” were they looking for me? Was “Cindy Hollywood and Highland” a search for my photo, titled “Hollywood and Highland”? Who exactly searched for “Cindy Agoncillo is a Filipino”?

– “Chinese chicken noodle soup” – I have a really great story about this, but I doubt that’s what someone was looking for when they searched for the phrase online!

– “annoying goody goody boy characters on television” – I don’t know who is searching for this, but they probably ended up reading my post about the absence of “good kids” in today’s media.

– “‘Sally Esh’ Amish dinner cost” and “Amish dinner with Sally Esh” – I once at lunch at the home of Sally Esh, an Amish woman in Lancaster County, PA. I don’t know how much the meal cost, and I don’t know why anyone else would want to know.

Cindy Agoncillo Blog, Wishlist Update

Wishlist Update: #22 – A Night with Wong Fu Productions

Friday, April 15, 2011
12:30 PM  After a half day of work, I left the Harrisburg, PA area to make the 3-hour drive to Princeton, NJ. As part of the Asian Heritage Month celebration, the Asian Heritage Council of Princeton University was hosting an event that evening featuring Wong Fu Productions. The Facebook event page kept reiterating the event was “first come, first serve.” If you wanted to guarantee a seat, you had to arrive early. Since they were already expecting between 300 and 400 people – students, visiting “pre-frosh,” and general fans like me – for a room that only seats 360, I decided I should try to be among the “first come.” For several days, I put in extra hours so I could leave work as early as possible. At 12:30 I was out the door.

3:30 PM  In spite of New Jersey’s “All Turns From Right Lane” jughandles, I made it to Princeton’s campus without incident or wrong turns. The greatest navigational difficulty was finding McCosh 10, the lecture hall where Wong Fu would be speaking. I didn’t want to ask anyone for directions. I hate looking like a tourist, even when I am one (“I’m taking pictures because I’m a photographer”). Sudden stops and a few wrong turns later, I finally found McCosh 10 – 3.5 hours before the event was scheduled to begin.

http://twitter.com/#!/CindyAgoncillo/status/58978152885653504

4:30 PM  I was definitely the first person to show up for the event, but soon, other groups came looking for McCosh 10. I had to keep telling people, “I’m actually not a student here, so I really have no idea what’s going on.” I decided to move from the hallway into the auditorium and grab a seat at the back of the room. A line was supposed to form there before the doors opened at 7, so I figured I would easily be at the front of the line. I took out my computer and caught up on reading design blogs, Twitter, and Facebook status updates.

4:45 PM  I remembered I still hadn’t watched the newest episode of The Office – Will Ferrell’s first appearance as Deangelo Vickers. Within moments of heading over to Hulu, I heard voices and laughter in the stairwell heading up to the auditorium. The one I recognized as Phil Wang’s was talking about how heat rises. Hmm, the room was rather warm. I turned around, and there they were. Princeton students. AND Wong Fu Productions. Continue reading “Wishlist Update: #22 – A Night with Wong Fu Productions” →