so on sunday we decided to take tofu on a walk when it was cooler, so we went out around 8:30pm. we walked to the park and i've never seen so many people out walking around! i guess everyone must have had the same idea as us! anyways, so she did her usual running around on the field and julian and i watched her as usual. it started getting really dark so we headed home.
the next morning i woke up with bug bites EVERYWHERE!!! when i first woke up i just noticed one on my stomach. hopped in the shower and came out, and noticed ALL these bug bites at the bottom of my feet. throughout the entire day i kept on finding new bug bites everywhere!! back of my knee, upper thigh, arms, shoulder. they weren't as itchy yesterday, but today they are driving me nuts! argh. i guess it must have been on our lovely walk on sunday, i seriously hope it was not anything from our bed! julian only got 2 bug bites and somehow i ended up with 20!! i seem to have really bad luck with that park, stung by a bee, eaten by bugs. i'm very wary of going there now, sigh.
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
Monday, July 24, 2006
the heat is killing me!!
it's so hot!! our house doesn't have A/C so having NY weather without A/C is HORRIBLE!!! it's like an oven! we have a fan basically running the whole day (and even at night when we're sleeping because our bedroom is super hot since it's upstairs) which helps a bit, but now i use a spray bottle and spray my body with water every 5 to 10 seconds. it actually really helps a lot. and we're making a lot of ice to put in our water. ugh. i think we might need to invest in a portable air conditioner, i don't know how it works, but i went to fry's today to buy a new phone and i saw 2 people buying them. and there was also a sign that said that all the portable air conditioners were sold out, haha. i think those that were buying them were buying ones that people had returned. i'm afraid to see our electricity bill next month, but i guess it probably would have been less than if we did have a/c and used it. too bad tofu can't talk, i wonder if she's hot?! she's still able to run around and stuff, so i guess it's not so bad. i can't wait until this heat wave is over!!!
Friday, July 21, 2006
new responsibilities
i guess i've been so busy with all my vacations that i've forgotten to update about my work situation. now that all my vacations are over, it's time to work hard again. so my manager announced in may that he was retiring at the end of june (after 39 years with my company!!) my manager's manager wanted to try a new process in finding a replacement for him by having 5 employees interview the candidates and i was one of the chosen ones to be on the interview committee. one of the candidates was my team lead! and another one was someone that had interned in my dept a few years ago and i used to go to lunch with her occasionally, and the last candidate i didn't know at all. so right before i left for las vegas we did all the interviews and our committee decided that my team lead was the best candidate. after we talked with our manager's manager, she basically said whoever we chose would be the next manager. so now my team lead is going to be manager, that leaves me with the most experience on the team. so it looks like i'm going to be groomed into the team lead position, but for now since i'm the only one doing a lot of the coding, they need to get more people onto our team to train. so yay, a change. i think it'll be fun and i guess i'll have more responsibility, we'll see how it goes!
Thursday, July 20, 2006
new york
i guess since all my friends are lazy-butts i'll have to do a quick recap of our 3 day weekend in NY. =)
in ny we stayed with sharon who is interning during the summer in manhattan. she has a lovely studio apt on the upper east side. shal and i flew out from CA fri night (on different airlines) but we both arrived in ny at 7:30am. we had a lovely time on the subway trying to figure out how to get to her apt. the line we were on converted to another line so it wouldn't stop at the station where we were planning on switching trains! so several people gave us different routes we could take and finally we just picked one. we finally ended up at her apartment at 9:30!
sharon and shal showered and we had breakfast/lunch at ess-a-bagel. they were huge and pretty good. sharon and shal got poppy seed bagels so they had a lovely time trying to pick them out of their teeth hehe. at 12pm we had an appointment in bloomingdales with chanel to get makeovers just for fun. the 3 of us looked very pretty, i forgot to take before and after pictures! ah well. nancy and alice met up with us in bloomingdale's. after our makeovers we walked back to sharon's apt so nancy and alice could drop off their bags. we ended up chatting for a long while and couldn't really think of anything to do. eventually around 4 or 5pm, we decided we needed to get off our lazy butts. the only thing that got us motivated was FOOD! haha so we went to shake shack in madison square park. the 5 of us shared 2 burgers (1 with just portabella mushroom, 1 with portabella and meat patty) and a large strawberry shake. they were yummy. then we decided we needed to try another snack, so we walked really far to washington square park area to mamoun's where we shared one shwarma (i think that's what it was, i have no idea, i just ate it haha) it was ok, a little lamb-y. after our little snack jaunt, we went back to sharon's apt to get ready for dinner haha. yes we are pigs, all we did was eat(which seems to be the norm for all my vacations!) we had dinner at les sans culottes, we had a very interesting appetizer. it was a rack of SEVERAL sausages and a basket of fruit. here's a pic.
it was ok. the entrees were big but weren't that great. and for dessert we had flan or chocolate mousse. after dinner we tried to get into bed (a lounge), but they would only let us in if we bought 2 bottles (which 5 girls would NEVER be able to finish) so we opted out and decided to go to hotel gansevoort's rooftop lounge in the meatpacking district. the lounge is beautiful and had lots of pretty people (including us of course!). we were lucky enough to score some seats so we sat there for a few hours just chatting and enjoying each other's company. around 1am, we headed back to sharon's apt. she was able to borrow an air mattress so 2 girls on her bed, 2 on the air mattress, 1 on the sofa!
sunday we met up with sharon's friend dave and had brunch at norma's in le parker meridien. they told us it was a 2 hour wait, but we only ended up waiting an hour. the food was ok. afterwards we went shopping. spend a loong time in strawberry and then went to bergdorf goodman, where alice and i got really cute clutches and i got a pair of jeans. by the time we were done with bergdorf, we had to walk back and rest/get ready for dinner. nancy wasn't going to join us so we said goodbye to her and off we went to dinner. we had a lovely dinner at babbo and ate some really good italian food. after dinner alice went back to philadelphia and sharon,shal, and i went back to her apt. for dessert we wanted to go to serendipity, but they told us the wait was 2 hours! we went at 8pm and they told us to check back in an hour. we stopped by dylan's candy bar and bought lots of candy and then decided to just go back to the apt (only 3 blocks away). we were too lazy to go back at 9, so we just went back around 10pm (sharon fell asleep by then, so it was just me and shal). we asked how long the wait was and they said 45 minutes, but we told them we came at 8 so they gave us the next available table! whew. we both got the frozen hot chocolates and they were yummy, very refreshing. and i loove chocolate! that night shal and i planned out what we were going to do the next day and marked everything on a map.
on monday sharon had to work, so it was just me and shal. we walked to central park took a picture at bethesda fountain next to the lake. she wanted to see the turtle pond but we got very lost, and ended up walking through like a jungle/forest type area. there were no signs or maps anywhere and all we could see were trees and we had no idea where we were. eventually we found our way to the main road and finally found the silly turtle pond!! we spent over 2 hours in central park wandering around aimlessly!! at first we thought there weren't any turtles, but when we looked closely we were able to see them. so next on our agenda was to go to soho and lunch at dos caminos. we took the subway but apparently silly me left our map that contained ALL the locations we were going to visit the rest of the day on the subway. so when we got off, we had no idea where dos caminos was!! we ended up asking someone in kenneth cole and he told us where it was. dos caminos had yummy guacamole and mojitos, but the cactus pear margarita was so so strong!! i actually ordered the margarita and shal the mojito, but i couldn't drink mine because it tasted so nasty, so shal ended up switching drinks with me. since it was so strong she became very happy and we ended up giggling a lot haha. since we didn't have a map, we stopped by duane reade to see if they had any. we found zagat and looked up all the places we were going to go to! whew. we then shopped a bit in soho. my feet were so so so tired, we walked around so much! after shopping we went to joe's pizza to try some new york pizza, supposedly it was in spiderman. the pizza was pretty good. next door was beard papa's and shal didn't want a vanilla cream puff like i recommended and instead got a chocolate eclair. afterwards we walked to magnolia bakery to buy some cupcakes. since we're super pigs we cabbed to buttercup bakery to buy some more cupcakes! we ended up buying 10 each to bring home. we went to both so we can compare who had the better cupcakes, i think magnolia's were a little better but buttercup had better flavors. for dinner we met up with sharon at sushisamba and of course sharon arrived drunk haha. she was very wired during dinner it was funny. the food was ok. when we got back to the apt sharon crashed and fell asleep.
tues morning we flew home! our flight was at 7am so we got a cab at 5:30am. our taxi driver drove super fast because we arrived at jfk around 5:50!! he dropped off shally first, and then somehow got lost trying to get to my terminal. i was in the taxi an extra 15 minutes, i was afraid i might miss my flight!! but luckily the lines weren't long so i was able to make my flight =) it was a fun trip, the weather was great (no thunderstorms at least). i'm already wanting to go back!!! it was nice to have free lodging (thanks sharon!), and i used my frequent flier miles so my only expenses were the shopping and food, not bad!
in ny we stayed with sharon who is interning during the summer in manhattan. she has a lovely studio apt on the upper east side. shal and i flew out from CA fri night (on different airlines) but we both arrived in ny at 7:30am. we had a lovely time on the subway trying to figure out how to get to her apt. the line we were on converted to another line so it wouldn't stop at the station where we were planning on switching trains! so several people gave us different routes we could take and finally we just picked one. we finally ended up at her apartment at 9:30!
sharon and shal showered and we had breakfast/lunch at ess-a-bagel. they were huge and pretty good. sharon and shal got poppy seed bagels so they had a lovely time trying to pick them out of their teeth hehe. at 12pm we had an appointment in bloomingdales with chanel to get makeovers just for fun. the 3 of us looked very pretty, i forgot to take before and after pictures! ah well. nancy and alice met up with us in bloomingdale's. after our makeovers we walked back to sharon's apt so nancy and alice could drop off their bags. we ended up chatting for a long while and couldn't really think of anything to do. eventually around 4 or 5pm, we decided we needed to get off our lazy butts. the only thing that got us motivated was FOOD! haha so we went to shake shack in madison square park. the 5 of us shared 2 burgers (1 with just portabella mushroom, 1 with portabella and meat patty) and a large strawberry shake. they were yummy. then we decided we needed to try another snack, so we walked really far to washington square park area to mamoun's where we shared one shwarma (i think that's what it was, i have no idea, i just ate it haha) it was ok, a little lamb-y. after our little snack jaunt, we went back to sharon's apt to get ready for dinner haha. yes we are pigs, all we did was eat(which seems to be the norm for all my vacations!) we had dinner at les sans culottes, we had a very interesting appetizer. it was a rack of SEVERAL sausages and a basket of fruit. here's a pic.
it was ok. the entrees were big but weren't that great. and for dessert we had flan or chocolate mousse. after dinner we tried to get into bed (a lounge), but they would only let us in if we bought 2 bottles (which 5 girls would NEVER be able to finish) so we opted out and decided to go to hotel gansevoort's rooftop lounge in the meatpacking district. the lounge is beautiful and had lots of pretty people (including us of course!). we were lucky enough to score some seats so we sat there for a few hours just chatting and enjoying each other's company. around 1am, we headed back to sharon's apt. she was able to borrow an air mattress so 2 girls on her bed, 2 on the air mattress, 1 on the sofa!
sunday we met up with sharon's friend dave and had brunch at norma's in le parker meridien. they told us it was a 2 hour wait, but we only ended up waiting an hour. the food was ok. afterwards we went shopping. spend a loong time in strawberry and then went to bergdorf goodman, where alice and i got really cute clutches and i got a pair of jeans. by the time we were done with bergdorf, we had to walk back and rest/get ready for dinner. nancy wasn't going to join us so we said goodbye to her and off we went to dinner. we had a lovely dinner at babbo and ate some really good italian food. after dinner alice went back to philadelphia and sharon,shal, and i went back to her apt. for dessert we wanted to go to serendipity, but they told us the wait was 2 hours! we went at 8pm and they told us to check back in an hour. we stopped by dylan's candy bar and bought lots of candy and then decided to just go back to the apt (only 3 blocks away). we were too lazy to go back at 9, so we just went back around 10pm (sharon fell asleep by then, so it was just me and shal). we asked how long the wait was and they said 45 minutes, but we told them we came at 8 so they gave us the next available table! whew. we both got the frozen hot chocolates and they were yummy, very refreshing. and i loove chocolate! that night shal and i planned out what we were going to do the next day and marked everything on a map.
on monday sharon had to work, so it was just me and shal. we walked to central park took a picture at bethesda fountain next to the lake. she wanted to see the turtle pond but we got very lost, and ended up walking through like a jungle/forest type area. there were no signs or maps anywhere and all we could see were trees and we had no idea where we were. eventually we found our way to the main road and finally found the silly turtle pond!! we spent over 2 hours in central park wandering around aimlessly!! at first we thought there weren't any turtles, but when we looked closely we were able to see them. so next on our agenda was to go to soho and lunch at dos caminos. we took the subway but apparently silly me left our map that contained ALL the locations we were going to visit the rest of the day on the subway. so when we got off, we had no idea where dos caminos was!! we ended up asking someone in kenneth cole and he told us where it was. dos caminos had yummy guacamole and mojitos, but the cactus pear margarita was so so strong!! i actually ordered the margarita and shal the mojito, but i couldn't drink mine because it tasted so nasty, so shal ended up switching drinks with me. since it was so strong she became very happy and we ended up giggling a lot haha. since we didn't have a map, we stopped by duane reade to see if they had any. we found zagat and looked up all the places we were going to go to! whew. we then shopped a bit in soho. my feet were so so so tired, we walked around so much! after shopping we went to joe's pizza to try some new york pizza, supposedly it was in spiderman. the pizza was pretty good. next door was beard papa's and shal didn't want a vanilla cream puff like i recommended and instead got a chocolate eclair. afterwards we walked to magnolia bakery to buy some cupcakes. since we're super pigs we cabbed to buttercup bakery to buy some more cupcakes! we ended up buying 10 each to bring home. we went to both so we can compare who had the better cupcakes, i think magnolia's were a little better but buttercup had better flavors. for dinner we met up with sharon at sushisamba and of course sharon arrived drunk haha. she was very wired during dinner it was funny. the food was ok. when we got back to the apt sharon crashed and fell asleep.
tues morning we flew home! our flight was at 7am so we got a cab at 5:30am. our taxi driver drove super fast because we arrived at jfk around 5:50!! he dropped off shally first, and then somehow got lost trying to get to my terminal. i was in the taxi an extra 15 minutes, i was afraid i might miss my flight!! but luckily the lines weren't long so i was able to make my flight =) it was a fun trip, the weather was great (no thunderstorms at least). i'm already wanting to go back!!! it was nice to have free lodging (thanks sharon!), and i used my frequent flier miles so my only expenses were the shopping and food, not bad!
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
4th of july week
since we got both mon and tues off for 4th of july, we decided to use 3 of our vacation days to take the whole week off!
we went down to LA last friday afternoon, not really that much traffic. we had dinner at houston's. saturday we went shopping at south coast plaza (my favorite place to shop in LA!) all the stores were having some good sales, so i bought some stuff. had dinner at gina lee's bistro with some of julian's friends and watched superman afterwards. i thought it was ok. sunday we had brunch with some of julian's friends and went to visit the korean friendship bell. (yes we couldn't think of anything better to do haha) we drove by palos verde and every time we drive by i think about how nice it would be live there (they have nice houses next to the beach). ahhh maybe one day. monday we had lunch in alhambra, and went to the santa anita mall. at 4pm was the wedding for my coworker joe at the san gabriel hilton. the bride looked beautiful and she's so so skinny but she's only 22! it was incredibly hot outside, i was so glad the ceremony was short. sucks for the guys who had to wear pants and long sleeves! hehe. the reception was indoors thank goodness but the chinese food wasn't that good. the centerpieces were very nice though. it was more of a chinese wedding vs american wedding because the MC spoke in chinese mainly and translated into english occasionally. they played A LOT of games and the bride and groom didn't get to eat much at all!
tues morning we left for vegas!! woohoo! it took us about 4 hours. when we arrived it was overcast and wasn't as hot as i expected. we met up with jody and heeyup for lunch and ate at mgm at wichcraft - a sandwich place. it was ok. we gambled a bit and i lost $50 playing blackjack. jody and heeyup went back home and julian and i walked through cesear's palace and looked through some of the shops. it's changed so much since i last went there, there are so many more stores there! it's kind of crazy. then we walked over to bellagio and looked at some of the stores there. had some gelato at a new store with a huuuuge chocolate fountain in the front, don't remember the name.
we met up with jody and heeyup for dinner at mesa grill. essentially the 2 couples ordered the same dishes, except we chose 2 different appetizers. we both got the pork and a coffee encrusted filet for entrees. the filet was not very good but the pork was. julian was disappointed. afterwards we went to shadowbar where girls dance behind screens to create a shadow. there was one girl who was topless and had very large boobs. yikes! afterwards, julian and heeyup played bj for a little bit until julian lost $100 and heeyup won $100.
on wed we went to the las vegas outlet center at the end of the strip and it sucked. i definitely would not go back there again. we had lunch at a bar & grill in Rio which wasn't that great. went back to the venetian and wanted to go to the pool but it was closed due to lightning! bummer. i ended up taking a nap and then we went over to mgm. we went to the m&m store and looked around and then played bj a bit before dinner. i broke even but julian ended up losing another $100. for dinner we went to craftsteak (tom colicchio's restaurant from top chef - he also owns Craft in NY which i want to try one day) i got a roasted corn soup as an appetizer which was really creamy and yummy. for entrees i got a petite filet and julian got a kobe beef flat iron steak and we got 2 sides, white corn and potatoes au gratin. everything was good but the kobe beef was the best. for dessert julian got a cinnamon pull apart bread that you dip in caramel which was very tasty and i got some pineapple sorbet. we were quite full afterwards. we were going to check out tao afterwards since it was in the venetian and we could get in for free since we were guests, but we were too tired so we just went back to our room.
on thurs we had lunch at the bellagio buffet, it was ok. i like their sunday brunch buffet much better. we then walked over to the fashion show mall (took 30 minutes, but it wasn't TOO bad) we walked around a lot because we needed to work off all the food we were eating!! most of the time it was overcast, so it was warm, but at least the sun wasn't pounding down on you. fashion show mall is huge! i'm so jealous of jody, she'll have some great shopping and food on the strip! anyways, we didn't walk through the whole mall just the major dept stores - neimans, saks, macys, nordstorms. i want to buy some rock & republic jeans but none of them had a good selection i loved look at the shoes and bags they had though! afterwards we went over to the wynn hotel across the street. the hotel was ok, i loved looking at the shoes at manolo blahnik. for the ferrari display you have to pay $10 each so we just browsed the store. we walked back to venetian and were finally able to go to the pool! they have 3-4 different pools and one of them is just filled with lounge chairs. it was cool, i should have taken a picture. but the lounge chairs are in the water and the pool is maybe like a foot deep? so you can sunbathe but cool yourself down with the water. the water is pretty warm though.
that night we went back to bellagio and had dinner at olives. jody told us not to go because she said the boston one was much better, but we decided to try it anyways. the food was OK, we probably wouldn't go back. we got a tuna tartare appetizer and for entrees julian got halibut and i got the pea & mint ravioli. the service was incredibly slow so we didn't have time for the vanilla bean souffle that jody recommended!!! i was so sad. after dinner we went to see O, i didn't like it as much as other cirque du soleil shows, but julian's parents went to see Ka and really enjoyed it.
fri we had dinner at burger bar in mandalay bay which has pretty good kobe beef burgers. for dessert we stopped by chocolate swan and got a chocolate eclair and ice cream. the chocolate eclair was really good! then we drove home from vegas back to SJ!! took about 8 hours. we hit a little traffic about an hour into our drive because it was pouring and we saw an overturned truck and a section of the highway was flooded. other than that it was relatively traffic free. we went to pick up tofu from my parent's house and she was so so dirty haha. they let her roam around in the backyard so gets really dirty i guess. we gave her a bath immediately when we got home.
we went down to LA last friday afternoon, not really that much traffic. we had dinner at houston's. saturday we went shopping at south coast plaza (my favorite place to shop in LA!) all the stores were having some good sales, so i bought some stuff. had dinner at gina lee's bistro with some of julian's friends and watched superman afterwards. i thought it was ok. sunday we had brunch with some of julian's friends and went to visit the korean friendship bell. (yes we couldn't think of anything better to do haha) we drove by palos verde and every time we drive by i think about how nice it would be live there (they have nice houses next to the beach). ahhh maybe one day. monday we had lunch in alhambra, and went to the santa anita mall. at 4pm was the wedding for my coworker joe at the san gabriel hilton. the bride looked beautiful and she's so so skinny but she's only 22! it was incredibly hot outside, i was so glad the ceremony was short. sucks for the guys who had to wear pants and long sleeves! hehe. the reception was indoors thank goodness but the chinese food wasn't that good. the centerpieces were very nice though. it was more of a chinese wedding vs american wedding because the MC spoke in chinese mainly and translated into english occasionally. they played A LOT of games and the bride and groom didn't get to eat much at all!
tues morning we left for vegas!! woohoo! it took us about 4 hours. when we arrived it was overcast and wasn't as hot as i expected. we met up with jody and heeyup for lunch and ate at mgm at wichcraft - a sandwich place. it was ok. we gambled a bit and i lost $50 playing blackjack. jody and heeyup went back home and julian and i walked through cesear's palace and looked through some of the shops. it's changed so much since i last went there, there are so many more stores there! it's kind of crazy. then we walked over to bellagio and looked at some of the stores there. had some gelato at a new store with a huuuuge chocolate fountain in the front, don't remember the name.
we met up with jody and heeyup for dinner at mesa grill. essentially the 2 couples ordered the same dishes, except we chose 2 different appetizers. we both got the pork and a coffee encrusted filet for entrees. the filet was not very good but the pork was. julian was disappointed. afterwards we went to shadowbar where girls dance behind screens to create a shadow. there was one girl who was topless and had very large boobs. yikes! afterwards, julian and heeyup played bj for a little bit until julian lost $100 and heeyup won $100.
on wed we went to the las vegas outlet center at the end of the strip and it sucked. i definitely would not go back there again. we had lunch at a bar & grill in Rio which wasn't that great. went back to the venetian and wanted to go to the pool but it was closed due to lightning! bummer. i ended up taking a nap and then we went over to mgm. we went to the m&m store and looked around and then played bj a bit before dinner. i broke even but julian ended up losing another $100. for dinner we went to craftsteak (tom colicchio's restaurant from top chef - he also owns Craft in NY which i want to try one day) i got a roasted corn soup as an appetizer which was really creamy and yummy. for entrees i got a petite filet and julian got a kobe beef flat iron steak and we got 2 sides, white corn and potatoes au gratin. everything was good but the kobe beef was the best. for dessert julian got a cinnamon pull apart bread that you dip in caramel which was very tasty and i got some pineapple sorbet. we were quite full afterwards. we were going to check out tao afterwards since it was in the venetian and we could get in for free since we were guests, but we were too tired so we just went back to our room.
on thurs we had lunch at the bellagio buffet, it was ok. i like their sunday brunch buffet much better. we then walked over to the fashion show mall (took 30 minutes, but it wasn't TOO bad) we walked around a lot because we needed to work off all the food we were eating!! most of the time it was overcast, so it was warm, but at least the sun wasn't pounding down on you. fashion show mall is huge! i'm so jealous of jody, she'll have some great shopping and food on the strip! anyways, we didn't walk through the whole mall just the major dept stores - neimans, saks, macys, nordstorms. i want to buy some rock & republic jeans but none of them had a good selection i loved look at the shoes and bags they had though! afterwards we went over to the wynn hotel across the street. the hotel was ok, i loved looking at the shoes at manolo blahnik. for the ferrari display you have to pay $10 each so we just browsed the store. we walked back to venetian and were finally able to go to the pool! they have 3-4 different pools and one of them is just filled with lounge chairs. it was cool, i should have taken a picture. but the lounge chairs are in the water and the pool is maybe like a foot deep? so you can sunbathe but cool yourself down with the water. the water is pretty warm though.
that night we went back to bellagio and had dinner at olives. jody told us not to go because she said the boston one was much better, but we decided to try it anyways. the food was OK, we probably wouldn't go back. we got a tuna tartare appetizer and for entrees julian got halibut and i got the pea & mint ravioli. the service was incredibly slow so we didn't have time for the vanilla bean souffle that jody recommended!!! i was so sad. after dinner we went to see O, i didn't like it as much as other cirque du soleil shows, but julian's parents went to see Ka and really enjoyed it.
fri we had dinner at burger bar in mandalay bay which has pretty good kobe beef burgers. for dessert we stopped by chocolate swan and got a chocolate eclair and ice cream. the chocolate eclair was really good! then we drove home from vegas back to SJ!! took about 8 hours. we hit a little traffic about an hour into our drive because it was pouring and we saw an overturned truck and a section of the highway was flooded. other than that it was relatively traffic free. we went to pick up tofu from my parent's house and she was so so dirty haha. they let her roam around in the backyard so gets really dirty i guess. we gave her a bath immediately when we got home.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
hooray!!
it's official, i'm done with school! my last grade has finally been posted and whew i passed. so I have a master's degree now, yippee. now i can REALLY celebrate in las vegas and new york! hooray hooray!
Monday, June 26, 2006
argh
my stupid bee sting is still very very itchy!! there's a large rectangular swollen red patch that is driving me crazy! i really hope it goes away soon.
i finished the 2nd season of 24! onto season 3!
i watched cars and capote over the weekend. both movies were pretty good. i now want to read in cold blood
i finished the 2nd season of 24! onto season 3!
i watched cars and capote over the weekend. both movies were pretty good. i now want to read in cold blood
Thursday, June 22, 2006
san diego
we went to san diego last weekend. on friday we went to the zoo! it was really hot and my cheeks and nose got sunburnt. grr. and my feet were so tired from walking so much, the zoo is pretty big and not organized very well, so you have to backtrack a lot. here are some pics of my favorite animals
cute baby gorilla on top of it's mama
talllll giraffes
zebra - its stripes are so cool
swimming polar bear
polar bear after it's cool down session in the water
panda - this is the only one we could really see, but he was sleeping
on saturday was julian's brother's graduation. we had lunch in la jolla near his bro's apartment. and then we went over to ucsd for the graduation. it was hot! they had refreshments though, and we got this really tasty strawberry & mango icy drink. it was about 2 hours so it wasn't too bad. here's a pic with the graduate (although he actually didn't REALLY graduate, he just walked. he still has one more year to go! he wanted to walk with his friends so he did it this year instead of next)
after graduation we went to the UTC mall, it wasn't that great. but just walked around to kill some time. later we went to his bro's apartment to relax a bit before dinner. we ended up playing scattergories which was kinda fun playing with his family. for the letter "F" and terms of endearment, his mom put Fräulein ?? haha too funny for dinner we went to roy's, it was pretty good, better than our experience in hawaii.
sunday we went to brunch for father's day at this place called azul in la jolla. the view was gorgeous but the service and food sucked! oh well, i guess we were paying for the view, i would not recommend going there though. we ended up leaving at 2pm, and arrived back in SJ at 9:15pm. picked up tofu and went home! we were exhausted! we'll be driving back down to LA in another week or so, ugh!!!
cute baby gorilla on top of it's mama
talllll giraffes
zebra - its stripes are so cool
swimming polar bear
polar bear after it's cool down session in the water
panda - this is the only one we could really see, but he was sleeping
on saturday was julian's brother's graduation. we had lunch in la jolla near his bro's apartment. and then we went over to ucsd for the graduation. it was hot! they had refreshments though, and we got this really tasty strawberry & mango icy drink. it was about 2 hours so it wasn't too bad. here's a pic with the graduate (although he actually didn't REALLY graduate, he just walked. he still has one more year to go! he wanted to walk with his friends so he did it this year instead of next)
after graduation we went to the UTC mall, it wasn't that great. but just walked around to kill some time. later we went to his bro's apartment to relax a bit before dinner. we ended up playing scattergories which was kinda fun playing with his family. for the letter "F" and terms of endearment, his mom put Fräulein ?? haha too funny for dinner we went to roy's, it was pretty good, better than our experience in hawaii.
sunday we went to brunch for father's day at this place called azul in la jolla. the view was gorgeous but the service and food sucked! oh well, i guess we were paying for the view, i would not recommend going there though. we ended up leaving at 2pm, and arrived back in SJ at 9:15pm. picked up tofu and went home! we were exhausted! we'll be driving back down to LA in another week or so, ugh!!!
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
just my luck!
you know how i don't like bees? now i REALLY don't like them! yesterday on our walk with tofu, i got stung by a bee!! on the bottom of my foot!!! waaah. on our walks we usually take her to a park which has a really large grassy area so we were walking across it and i felt this stinging pain on the bottom of my foot. I screamed and julian was like what? what? and i showed him the bottom of my foot and the bee was still stuck in there!! oy. so he flicked it off and took the stinger out. now my wound is reallllly itchy. there's a large patch of redness around it, i wonder if it might be a slight allergic reaction. but it's so hard to not scratch it, ugh!! so i guess i now know what it feels like to be stung by a bee. lucky me!
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Monday, June 12, 2006
weekend happenings
i got a pedicure friday evening and i think i've decided i should either get a sheer pinkish color or a dark red from now on. i chose a shimmery pink color but i think it blends too much with my skin. and i think a fuschia pink color would be too bright.
julian's parents came up to visit this weekend because they were attending a wedding reception on saturday. and somehow we got roped into going as well. it was julian's dad's cousin's sister in law's wedding! it was in sunnyvale at the lion & compass restaurant. the food was ok, but the reception was kind of boring especially in the end because all they did was talk. so boring. oh well, i can't believe julian's family is so huge! so hard to keep track of.
this is my last week of class!!!! i just have a final to finish, a presentation to give tomorrow morning, and then i'll be done!!! on thurs we're off to san diego for julian's brother's graduation. so if you have any recommendations of places to see or do or eat at let me know!!
julian's parents came up to visit this weekend because they were attending a wedding reception on saturday. and somehow we got roped into going as well. it was julian's dad's cousin's sister in law's wedding! it was in sunnyvale at the lion & compass restaurant. the food was ok, but the reception was kind of boring especially in the end because all they did was talk. so boring. oh well, i can't believe julian's family is so huge! so hard to keep track of.
this is my last week of class!!!! i just have a final to finish, a presentation to give tomorrow morning, and then i'll be done!!! on thurs we're off to san diego for julian's brother's graduation. so if you have any recommendations of places to see or do or eat at let me know!!
Friday, June 09, 2006
new panera location
there's one pretty close to our house now, near the airport, just opened yesterday. yay! and the strawberry salad is back.
i'm seriously addicted to 24 now. i finished the first season and just finished disc 2 of season 2 last night. i have to take a break for a week though because i'm busy with school, but i want to see what happens next! argh!!
i'm seriously addicted to 24 now. i finished the first season and just finished disc 2 of season 2 last night. i have to take a break for a week though because i'm busy with school, but i want to see what happens next! argh!!
Thursday, June 08, 2006
summer time
i love summer, it's my favorite season. love the warm weather, wearing sandals, and most importantly, has the best fruits! it's cherry season! haha. i even went to costco to see if they had those 4lb tub thingies, but they didn't. we went to the farmer's market and it was $7.50/lb!!!!! i just got a little and it was already $5. sigh. but they were realllllly good. i'll have to get them at the supermarket and hope my local costco gets theirs soon! it's also peach/nectarine season!!! we got some white nectarines from the farmer's market, yumyum. and julian's favorite is watermelon. so we've had a looot of fruit lately. it's kind of weird, during the winter we don't really eat much fruit because there isn't much selection other than apples and oranges. but summer time rolls around, we have fruits galore! i also think it's cold in the winter and i don't really like eating cold stuff. all the fruit i buy i always put in the fridge so it's too cooold to eat.
Friday, June 02, 2006
busy busy beeee
looking at the calendar i'm going to be so busy from now until mid-july. sigh. i just have two more weeks of class! then i'll be doneeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. you don't know how much i'm looking forward to it, but i have a lot of work to do though so my next two weekends will be busy doing HW!
in 2 weeks we're going to San Diego for julian's brother's graduation
2 weeks later we're going down to LA for a wedding and then las vegas (sooo much driving!)
and then a week later i'm off to new york!
i'm looking forward to all my trips, but dreading these last two weeks of school!
oh yeah, i saw X3 also. did anyone that saw it stay through the credits? they had a little teaser scene afterwards. anyways, it was quite intriguing =P i didn't really like X3 that much, the plot was very weak. but i guess it was for the action, so it was still entertaining!
in 2 weeks we're going to San Diego for julian's brother's graduation
2 weeks later we're going down to LA for a wedding and then las vegas (sooo much driving!)
and then a week later i'm off to new york!
i'm looking forward to all my trips, but dreading these last two weeks of school!
oh yeah, i saw X3 also. did anyone that saw it stay through the credits? they had a little teaser scene afterwards. anyways, it was quite intriguing =P i didn't really like X3 that much, the plot was very weak. but i guess it was for the action, so it was still entertaining!
french laundry
so i guess i've been neglecting my blog, but i'm too lazy to write anything (it'll take waaay too long)
so here's another photo entry:
French Laundry
salmon tartare coronet (very very good!)
oysters & caviar (very very good, one of my favs)
lobster mitts (very very good, another of my favs)
mango sorbet
very very veeeeery stuffed
all the courses at french laundry were very good except the 2 meat dishes (rabbit & lamb) which was kind of odd because most other places we've been to the meat dishes are the best. the desserts were also very good, we were soo soo stuffed, they also had a lot of extra little things before & after the meal. another interesting thing is that they only bring out bread on certain courses, and each time it's different breads to choose from. i only posted some of the dishes, because there are so many. some of them are half-eaten because i forgot to take them at the beginning like the one below of the lamb. oh, and the waiter commented on the funny way i ate my lamb because i like to cut everything before i start eating heh
so here's another photo entry:
French Laundry
salmon tartare coronet (very very good!)
oysters & caviar (very very good, one of my favs)
lobster mitts (very very good, another of my favs)
mango sorbet
very very veeeeery stuffed
all the courses at french laundry were very good except the 2 meat dishes (rabbit & lamb) which was kind of odd because most other places we've been to the meat dishes are the best. the desserts were also very good, we were soo soo stuffed, they also had a lot of extra little things before & after the meal. another interesting thing is that they only bring out bread on certain courses, and each time it's different breads to choose from. i only posted some of the dishes, because there are so many. some of them are half-eaten because i forgot to take them at the beginning like the one below of the lamb. oh, and the waiter commented on the funny way i ate my lamb because i like to cut everything before i start eating heh
Monday, May 15, 2006
mission impossible 3
we watched mi3 this weekend, it was better than i expected. i didn't want to watch it because i seriously can not stand tom cruise anymore after that whole katie holmes (i mean, kate cruise!!) episode. ugh. grosses me out. anyways.
there's one scene in shanghai where tom cruise is running and he's shouting "zou kai! zou kai!" (move in chinese) and after that, simon used the phrase the whooole weekend. we watched it fri night, and he used it all of sat when we were sf. plus he says it really funny too, his sounded like joe thai..haha.
simon's gf was visiting for the weekend and so were two of julian's friends. on sat we went to golden gate park (a veery nice day) and we walked around the de Young museum in the park, it was a fine arts museum i think. we were only in there for an hour or so. ate at a good japanese restaurant called maki in japan town.
sun we went to eat dim sum and waited an hour cause everyone was going for mother's day i guess. parking was annoying too. and for dinner we went with my mom to layang layang (malaysian) pretty good, julian liked it!
this weekend was soo busy and sooo much eating!
there's one scene in shanghai where tom cruise is running and he's shouting "zou kai! zou kai!" (move in chinese) and after that, simon used the phrase the whooole weekend. we watched it fri night, and he used it all of sat when we were sf. plus he says it really funny too, his sounded like joe thai..haha.
simon's gf was visiting for the weekend and so were two of julian's friends. on sat we went to golden gate park (a veery nice day) and we walked around the de Young museum in the park, it was a fine arts museum i think. we were only in there for an hour or so. ate at a good japanese restaurant called maki in japan town.
sun we went to eat dim sum and waited an hour cause everyone was going for mother's day i guess. parking was annoying too. and for dinner we went with my mom to layang layang (malaysian) pretty good, julian liked it!
this weekend was soo busy and sooo much eating!
Friday, May 12, 2006
show recommendations in vegas
avenue q has been cancelled in las vegas! apparently the wynn signed an exclusive deal with avenue q to only be in vegas and not go on tour, but i guess it wasn't making enough money or something, so it's been cancelled! so now we don't have a show to watch when we go in july. but now that it won't be at the wynn, they will be going on tour to a city near you soon!
so now we need some recommendations on some good shows. the shows we are considering: all the cirque shows except zumanity because we've seen it already (ka, o, or mystere), lance burton (i dunno about this but julian suggested a magic show heh) i think those are our only choices, so most likely we'll try to catch a cirque show. but which one??
so now we need some recommendations on some good shows. the shows we are considering: all the cirque shows except zumanity because we've seen it already (ka, o, or mystere), lance burton (i dunno about this but julian suggested a magic show heh) i think those are our only choices, so most likely we'll try to catch a cirque show. but which one??
Thursday, May 11, 2006
we have a ghost!
last night our vcr mysteriously started recording at 2am. it was very very weird. our vcr is old so it makes a lot of noise when it starts recording so it woke us up. the only thing that i have set for recording is a weekly wed 8-9pm recording which i set 3 weeks ago! i checked the vcr date & time this morning and it is set correctly. hrmm. i have no other explanation and neither does julian, so i've decided that it was a ghost! freaky! and the remote was next to the tv on top of our drawers, so we didn't sleep on it and it's too tall for tofu to reach!
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
picture entry
this was when we first got tofu, she's so small!
so cute!
this is her fat stage when we didn't give her a haircut for a looong time. she looks sooo big! i didn't think she looked that bad in real life haha
tofu likes to sunbathe, she always goes to find the patch of sun on the ground or on the sofa
another sunbathing photo and chewing her toy!
this is what she does a majority of the time, sleep!!
her tear stains are a lot better now. we have some pics where it looks sooo bad. and we now keep her hair a lot shorter! much cuter that way. she's almost 9 months and hasn't had a potty accident in the house for a while now! and she goes peepee outside now, but poopoo is still inside but always on her pad. she has done some naughty things while we're gone though, like eating a huge slice of carrot cake that we left on the coffee table! and knocking over (and breaking!) a glass we had on the table. i guess it's our own fault for leaving stuff on the table, ugh. at least she doesn't like our shoes! she's our little sweetie pie but i'm soooo glad the puppy years are almost over. she is so much better now that is older!!
so cute!
this is her fat stage when we didn't give her a haircut for a looong time. she looks sooo big! i didn't think she looked that bad in real life haha
tofu likes to sunbathe, she always goes to find the patch of sun on the ground or on the sofa
another sunbathing photo and chewing her toy!
this is what she does a majority of the time, sleep!!
her tear stains are a lot better now. we have some pics where it looks sooo bad. and we now keep her hair a lot shorter! much cuter that way. she's almost 9 months and hasn't had a potty accident in the house for a while now! and she goes peepee outside now, but poopoo is still inside but always on her pad. she has done some naughty things while we're gone though, like eating a huge slice of carrot cake that we left on the coffee table! and knocking over (and breaking!) a glass we had on the table. i guess it's our own fault for leaving stuff on the table, ugh. at least she doesn't like our shoes! she's our little sweetie pie but i'm soooo glad the puppy years are almost over. she is so much better now that is older!!
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
halfway there
5 weeks down, 5 more to go. i'm chugging along, i'm mildly stressed with the schoolwork, i'm really hating writing a 2-3 paper each week. even though it doesn't seem like much, i hate using my free time to do such things. in addition i have to work on my 8 page midterm as well. yuck.
we're going to our first wedding of the year this saturday. since we have so many weddings to go to, i've bought several new dresses hehe. oh yeah, and the coworker that i said that was going to propose soon? well he did. and the wedding is going to be in dec! not next year as i thought! so there's another to our long list of weddings. supposedly 2006 is a lucky year to get married. and 2005 was a very bad year to get married. good thing i'm not superstitious!
we're going to our first wedding of the year this saturday. since we have so many weddings to go to, i've bought several new dresses hehe. oh yeah, and the coworker that i said that was going to propose soon? well he did. and the wedding is going to be in dec! not next year as i thought! so there's another to our long list of weddings. supposedly 2006 is a lucky year to get married. and 2005 was a very bad year to get married. good thing i'm not superstitious!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)