October 27th, 2005 - 11:15PM - Mainly Food

Andrew brought me a carved seashell from his honeymoon in Vietnam. It's really cool how they carved the outer shell. He also had tons of interesting stories about his trip...the stuff in Vietnam like the "bride store" where you can pick a bride out of a lineup...his girl caddie presenting his clubs to him using both hands and bowing as if it was a sword or something. One of his buddies wouldn't even let his girl caddie ride on the cart but had her run behind him. Horrible. Apparently, Andrew got to try a bunch of watersports in Vietnam. Sounds a lot like when I went to Thailand and got to try waterskiing, parasailing, AND firing a machine gun. Ahhhhh, Thailand. He also said that the pho they have there comes in tiny bowls and that they looked at him funny cause he'd order 2 of them at once. Lots of good cheap food and seafood. He also had a friend (who was taking him around) who said that he'd have more fun if he had been visiting Vietnam while single. Whatever THAT's supposed to mean...hehe

Went back to China Palace...Seafood Tofu Clay Pot. It was alright although a little more salty than I'm used to. They always have free boba and are open till 3AM though!

Emily got me all these really interesting infused oils mainly for breads but I'm assuming for cooking as well. We made vegetarian pasta using the sundried but it came out differently than usual. There are infused garlic oil, sundried tomato and parmesan oil, and infused basil oil.

Here's a lobster at the new dim sum place at 99 Ranch...it's seriously monstrous. It was ok although LC and I got in a bit too late to try everything out. We didn't get to have the shrimp rolls but I did have some of the creamiest jook I've ever had. Everything else was pretty standard. Didn't even get dan ta.

I made Steamed Mandarin Fish for Emily on Sunday. It got pretty good reviews from her and her dad. Apparently, he thought that it was restaurant-bought. :-P I love green onions. Now I know how to make this...it's all in the sauce.

I also made this...it's Mabu Tofu Shrimp/Carrots/Portobello Mushrooms. LOTS of shrimp...I usually end up putting a lb of shrimp into any of my dishes. Enough for multiple days. Emily's co-worker Tracy said that she liked this one a lot. I definitely will have to make this one again since you can make a large batch and eat it over several days.

Homemade Hot & Sour Soup...didn't turn out as well but what do you expect from powder in a can? :-P

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm

I've noticed that after meeting Emily, I've been eating healthier more and more...

New Sony DVD+-RW DL...oh yeah...I'm finally in the age of creating movies on DVD. Mainly going to use it for backups though...

Preparation for Shrimp and Baby Bok Choy...getting faster at peeling them. I much rather peel my shrimp than get them pre-peeled. I dunno maybe until I get lazy or don't care as much anymore. They just seem so much crispier because the ice hasn't gotten to the shrimp as much when they still have their shells on.

Finshed Shrimp and Baby Bok Choy

Andrew took a few of us out to OSHA for lunch last Tuesday. It's this Thai place on 2nd that I didn't even know was there. Prices are <$10 which makes it very reasonable for the kind of place it looks to be (pricey). Andrew regaled us with very funny tales about Vietnam

Classy Thai Iced Teas

Chicken Green Curry...kinda sweet...maybe not as good as King of Thai but pretty good nonetheless. Emily and I had this whole discussion about mad vs avian flu. Apparently, some people at her work thought that you couldn't kill the viruses that cause avian flu because someone had heard that you couldn't do that with mad cow disease. However, the reason why people can't prevent mad cow disease by cooking meat is because it's caused prion proteins and not viruses at all. Well-cooked chicken is a way to prevent avian flu although this really won't matter since we're not projected to actually get it from chickens. The progression is supposed to be chickens -> chicken handlers -> rest of human population. This is far more likely than chickens -> rest of human population since we just don't deal with as many chickens as the handlers do. Another scary one is chickens -> other animals -> people. The fear is that the virus could mutate and "jump" to other animals which in turn could make it even easier to jump to humans.

You know FUBU, the thug clothing line? And how it means "For Us By Us"? I heard this somewhere...imagine a clothing line called "FKBK"...For Kids By Kids...:-D sounds like something Martha Stewart might be interested in...



October 19th, 2005 - 7:00AM - China Palace, Ming's Visit, Movies

Hot and Sour Soup at China Palace at this little shopping center near Milpitas Square. REALLY GOOD and spicy. Funny how both Emily, my mom, and I LOVE this soup.

Lamb Sour Cabbage Soup was disappointing really. Have to go have Darda's version sometime. This cabbage wasn't sour enough and the soup and lamb were bland.

Massive Storage...approaching 2 TERABYTES? I need a data server instead of this whole USB external-hd swapping business. My picture archive (dating back to 1998) is now 60GB. Each year, I end up with more data than the last. I remember when I got a 500MB drive back in 1992? and thinking it was a big deal.

2x15GB = 30GB (drives I got when I arrived at Berkeley circa 1998)
2x60GB = 120GB (got these while I was at Pixar circa 2001)
3x160  = 480GB (circa 2004)
2x200  = 400GB (circa 2004...when I stopped burning stuff to cds)
1x250  = 250GB (my newest addition!)
Total  = 1280GB

Bistro Burger for lunch with coworkers. There are all these little places around the corner...gourmet burgers are expensive. Well, they are using Niman Ranch beef.

After work on Friday, I went to Louie's with some coworkers for drinks. Here's Scott, Meg, and Marjo. Marjo is the lead singer of a band. I've promised to go and hear them sometime.

Sassy (Saskia), me, Vina, and Matt. Sassy is Korean but adopted by Germans so she grew up in Germany. Although she speaks fluent German, she doesn't like sauerkraut or pig's feet (Schweinshaxe). No idea what she's missing. Schweinshaxe was the first meal I had upon arriving in Germany years ago. I've always looked forward to eating it again in Germany. I had 3 pear ciders that night (too much)...the quesadillas were REALLY good. Ended up with a killer headache that night.

Emily's friend Ming came to visit SF from Vancouver so it gave Emily and I an opportunity to go places together that we had gone before separately. At the Golden Gate Bridge Overlook. It was a very beautiful day.

On Golden Gate...Ming is the one on the left.

At the Palace of Fine Arts...Emily and Angela

Emily and I

It's a holdup!

Sneaky Angela took a few shots

Strolling along...

Swans

Such a fluffy white dog

Intricate chessboard at Fisherman's Wharf

Detail of chessboard...Queen is carrying a knife

The Boudin Factory at Fisherman's Wharf...this is new....either I just haven't noticed it or it opened recently. Really cool.

Streetside bakers

Hmm mmm mmm crab is good!!! Alex and Yuchi's favorite place ended up being a place that I had been to before once. That time, I saw a cockroach. Hehehehe.

Buncha tourists! Actually, I like this picture a lot.

Very Berry Sundae at Ghirardelli...Alex and I got the same thing...we're very intelligent.

Fighting over ice cream

Intricate pagoda structure in SF on Hayes Green (Hayes and Octavia)...it was at night and I took the picture while illegally parked so I'll have to come back there...read about it here and here.

Mr. Raccoon...I caught him walking around and he was nice enough to pose for a picture.

I bought Emily a vase with bamboo and everything since her flowers end up dying and there's not much light in her cubicle. This one is actually a picture of mine though.

Here's her bamboo plant plus for Japanese class, she did some Ikebana (Japanese flower arranging)...aren't they pretty?

Last week, Angela got free tickets to see a prescreening of "Domino" at Berkeley so I went. One of the scenes was just too funny to watch (the romantic scene). There were some other funny scenes...also some nudity that was made even more hilarious cause Angela kept covering my eyes. Silly sister-in-law-to-be. Oh, in an interview with Keira, she said that showing her boobs in a movie was fine but not her butt so she had a butt double for scenes requiring a view of a butt. Weird Europeans but I'm not going to complain...

I finally saw "Crash"...I read reviews afterwards and had stuff to say about some of them...E Online said "way too many characters and storylines"...bullcrap, just cause you can't handle a story with more than 3 characters doesn't make it a bad movie. Reelviews said "characters are only half-formed"...man, you don't need life stories of all the characters when the point of the movie is to depict stereotypes. It's a great movie and it's definitely worth watching if only for the "omigod, I can't believe they said that..." factor.



October 11th, 2005 - 8:44AM - Lotsa Food, Car Stereo Installation

Emily's friend Lana and her husband live in San Mateo. On the way up there, this was the view on the left. Clouds billowing over from the ocean.

So before the LSAT, I stayed at Margaret's in order to save time getting to the test center (which had been changed from Concord to San Francisco) I even found parking right next to Moose's (Amazing for a Friday night). The Bay Bridge went through a lot of blasting and roadwork that weekend which closed off lanes...just thinking about going across the bridge in the morning to get to a test was enough to make me think of alternate plans. Thanks Margaret! After I got up at 6:45AM, I went over to Van Ness's Holiday Inn. Got me breakfast at Tully's and settled in for the wait. It was like 10 before we actually started to fill in our information on the Scantrons. Didn't get done till 4PM. Horribly long and it was tough but I'm glad other people seemed to think so as well.

Went to Tainan Fong Wei in Milpitas for dinner last week with Emily and her dad. Had some excellent dishes there (although slightly too oily) but neglected to take pictures...apparently the Hsuehs used to eat there often and would go down the menu so Emily's picks were pretty good.

Emily made a seafood dish from one of her mom's recipe books. It was very very tasty with scallops/fish thrown in with the veggies.

Had lunch with Meg, Priscilla, and William at Naan and Curry in the Tenderloin. We're like the most adventurous foodies out of everyone at work. :-P

Had dinner at Cafe Ophelia also last week. Seems like they got rid of the sea bass special we used to get...Emily got the Thai curry...my grill selection had soup which you can see here...huge crust on top.

The Seafood Stone Grill...has tuna, salmon, shrimp, scallops, squid, and veggies. They did use high quality stuff but in the end, it would have been better to go to hot pot esp cause this was kinda expensive. When it's expensive to cook your own stuff you know you're paying for something else. In this case, it was ambience.

Enjoying our passionfruit drink

This was at Marie Callander's in Milpitas. They had a lamb shank special that was pretty good although a little on the salty side. I have funny pics of Emily goofing off but I can't post them. :-P

Driving back Friday night from Emily's, I was listening to music in my car and suddenly I decided to get new speakers. The ones in the car were making noises at certain frequencies and it's been bugging me for the longest time. I was holding out for a long time for a nice component system to replace the one already in the car but in the end, I decided that I wasn't THAT BIG of an audiophile and just went and got speakers to replace the front ones. The tweeters weren't having a problem so it kinda made sense anyways. Sure, the amp/tweeters/speakers aren't perfectly tuned and matched but I'm not going to notice too much in my car. In any case, they sound great...hope they last for some time.

Here they are...you can't see them after I put the door panel back on because of the speaker grill...it's a shame cause they're just so pretty. Pretty cheap too...

Emily came over on Sunday and I made dinner...small bok choy and pea sprouts...I even took time to arrange them...hehehe...my plating skills need some work.

I also made sea snails and basil...I practically grew up eating this dish every once in while and it's been a LOOOOONG time since I had it...I did pretty good my first try though. For inspiration, I went to this website where they talk about how snails are prepared in Vietnam. Lots of garlic and soy sauce.

Here's a reason to eat fish (don't overdose on large one's...remember about mercury)...apparently it helps fend off brain degeneration...good thing I've been getting once a week for some time now.

Wallace and Gromit have a new movie coming out. I introduced LC to it a few weeks ago to her delight and I'm sure Emily will also enjoy it. A bit of sad news though...a fire consummed a lot of the old sets that they were keeping...read about it here.



October 4th, 2005 - 8:00PM - Omelet, FF7, Townhouse, Traci Potluck

I've been making a lot of veggies for meals for the last few weeks. Sorry! Emily and I both have been busy and so there hasn't been as much time to go out and do fun stuff. We'll be going to Taiwan/Japan in December though so at least we have that to look forward to. :-P

This rice wine was really really sweet

Margaret got done with her GRE last week. We went to the Ferry Building for lunch since Margaret had some coupons at Mistral Rotisserie Provencale. I had the Lamb with Cous Cous and Provencale Tomatoes. The soup was either Chicken or Butternut Squash Bisque. Usually I shudder at the thought of squash but I figured what the heck, it's healthy. Turned out that the soup was the best thing. Not too squashy although it was a little bland. Afterwards, we stopped by Ciao Bella Gelato where I got Guava and Peach. I loved the Guava gelato. The day was really sunny too so we got to eat it by the fountain.

I forgot to mention that at the "Raise the Red Lantern" performance, my old friend Joe did the Chinese introduction that preceded it. Mainly it was instructions to turn off cell phone but I instantly recognized his voice. Good job Joe! His "performance" was even written up in the Chronicle...here. Awesome Chinese pronunciation. I also saw Cathy's old classmate Michael who is at Berkeley and part times as an usher at Cal Performances.

Oh geez...I also forgot to mention that I watched Advent Children....awesome cg and great fight scenes. No spoilers here but here are some neat hi-res images I found on a site I frequent...click on them to get the full thing...

Sephiroth!!!!

I like big swords...

This scene with Tifa was really really cool.

The bikes were interesting but I expected better...

I use this one as a wallpaper for now...

Vincent plays a small role but he has some neat scenes as well...

Last Thursday, I had dinner with Lih-Chern at Townhouse in Emeryville. Her parents are visiting and she's going to go on a trip to Chile so I won't be seeing much of her for awhile. We both got the clam chowder which was kinda bland (had carrots in it...weird)...the service was a little slow...

LC's salmon came on weird stir fried veggies...

I was pretty satisfied with my dijon panko chicken breast w/spinach and garlic potatoes. The spinach was SUPER fresh and very crisp. It was like they had ripped them directly from the ground onto the plate.

Traci is leaving CMR to have her baby...had one of our best potlucks ever....yummm yummm....I brought sushi.

Yay!!! A downgrader for PSP 2.0 to 1.5 was released! The files plus instructions can be found here. I can play ROMS now and uhhhhhh ISOs.

CENSORED

LC went to the Folsom Street Fair...I would have wanted to have gone but....oh well...I thought this photo was funny cause they look so happy. :-P
In any case, I did find people who took pictures so I got a pretty good idea of what went on...LC had some VERY interesting stories to tell though...
Link 1
Link 2
...in them, you can see a guy with things wrapped around his things...also, a guy dragging a woman around in a cart while she holds a whip...

One of the streets in SF got turned into a ski jump. Sigh...it happened while I was at work...

I recently got the Logitech Mobile Freedom Bluetooth Headset to use with my cellphone. I'm very happy with it especially since I can increase the volume of the Razr which has been something of a problem.