I'm OFF THE MARKET!

Guess what?

I'm engaged! Yes, it finally happened and although this news is one and a half weeks old, it's been an amazing week and a half!

Daddy proposed to me at the place where he first asked for my number and the ring is, to say the least, incredible. Like seriously - I never accessorize and now I have this huge rock on my finger and it costs three times the value of our car (that being said, we drive a Mazda van, late '90s) and I'm feeling extremely overwhelmed with all these questions of "when's the big day?".

"It's still so new," I told Kat over the phone, who had coincidentally received a post-game play by play the night Daddy proposed, "so many things to get used to...the lingo...engaged...fiancee...kinda makes me gag a bit".

"It's always what you've wanted, isn't it?!"

"Yes. I think. Of course!" I'm off the market, I thought to myself. Sold. To the highest bidder. With a 1.2 karat brilliant round diamond ring, nestled in a platinum ring setting.

"HA...well we don't get to trade you for any camels now, do we.." I imagined my dad saying to me, after all these years of dating Persian guys. Yes, camel jokes run in the family as we are also part middle eastern.

Speaking of family, it took my family a couple of days to settle into the idea of their Chinese daughter marrying a White guy. Well, more my dad than anyone else. No really, my quest for the ultimate rebellion began in grade six when I loudly proclaimed in front of my parents that I would never ever ever date a Chinese guy, let alone marry one no matter how successful, rich and yadayada he was.

I met up with my grandma and aunt the day after and flashed her The Bling.

"Waaahhhhhhhhhh," they both exclaimed. That's one of the biggest compliments you can get as a Chinese person. The extended version of "wah".

After enduring a blissful week of dinners and ooh and ahhs, I can't help but wonder why women don't enjoy this seemingly short, transitional phase more often. I still can barely wrap my head around the new title of fiance, let alone pick a wedding date. Or a type of wedding. Or a wedding dress. And location. And guest list. And wedding favours and centerpieces and my head's about to explode just typing all this out!

"Take all the time you need...take your time...just don't take too long," warned my friend Dani, whose own wedding was an amazing gong show in Mexico, among church ruins and a big reception and the solid backing of her daddy's wallet, of course.

Uh yeah, getting Chinese parents to pay for anything means giving them unconditional rights to nag/criticize/nagnagnagnag you about whatever it is they've paid for. In this case, it'd be the wedding and anything to do with it, including my relationship.

"But I wanted to be engaged for like, five years!" I proclaimed to Daddy on the way home from another amazing dinner at a new italian restaurant, where I ordered grilled trout and vegetables out of all the things that you should order at a place that serves amazingly fresh carb-lover's pasta.

"Aw, don't worry love...no pressure, take your time..we have lots of time... but I did hear this somewhere that the longer you wait the more likely it isn't going to happen," Daddy responded nonchalantly.

Ok, that really helped, I thought to myself.

So I sat around and really didn't do much thinking. I just sat around and looked at that expensive rock on my hand, touching my hand every 10 minutes. Diamonds are good to have around though. As a feng shui fanatic, crystals and diamonds bring you luck - and I had an awesome week of luck.

Firstly, I landed a commercial. My first commercial, like one in which it's actually all about me and I can actually label myself a 'principal' rather than some fly-on-the-wall background actor or lame-o promotional model.

Secondly, I landed one of my authors (I'm a book publicist, btw) in a really big business magazine. I also landed another author on a prime TV news spot and another author on a prime radio show spot.

"Wow, if being engaged brings you luck like this, imagine what you could do if you were pregnant!" my lady boss joked. Har har, funny. Not.

"Well, let's not get too far ahead there, " I joked back. My lady boss is awesome. Thrice divorced or married, I can't remember, she once offered her staff a $5000 reward to find her a husband.

This week I have been settling into the idea of being engaged. By settling I mean, I'm still struggling to use the lingo and saying the word fiance still makes the back of my throat want to jump out of my mouth, but the thought of hunting for a cool wedding dress sounds good to me. I literally spent two full hours on The Knot. They have everything there. If you need to be swayed to have a traditional wedding with all the bells and whistles, that's the place to be. Two hours before surfing onto that site, my idea of a wedding was very simple: Fly to Italy, find a cute flowy white short tube dress, stick some flowers in my hair, elope, take lots of professional pics, have lots of newlywed sex (take some candid pics maybe?teehee), travel for a couple of weeks, fly home and treat the family and friends to dinner at some restaurant.

Two full hours on The Knot later, I've got six folders labelled 'Dress', 'Cake', 'Invites', 'Centerpieces', 'Location' and 'Other' with loads of pics in each one.

Help me. I need help.