A new noodle bar called Slurp just opened in my neighborhood, which MB and I were both excited to see. Usually we go to Ramen Setagaya, but it’s eight blocks away, which isn’t far but sometimes around the corner, which Slurp is, is nice.
So far I’ve been to Slurp twice, once with MB and last night on my own for takeout. Both times I’m afraid I wasn’t that impressed. The crispy rolls were good, but my pho was mediocre. The first time I had a spicy beef and last night the oxtail, and both times the meat was horribly fatty and gristly. Inedible in fact.
Now I like some fatty meat, but melt-in-your-mouth fatty, like the pork medallions at Setagaya, not as chewy as a wad of rubberbands. And for $14, a bowl of mediocre, gristly oxtail pho is so not worth it in my book.
Now if only Setegaya would move eight blocks closer to where I lived.
food
14
Apr 08
Slop
05
Mar 08
Stress eating
Is what I’ve been doing these past few days.
I thought it was hormonal but I realized just now as I scarfed down an egg, sausage, and cheese sandwich I definitely did not need that I’ve been finding comfort, albeit temporary, in bad bad food.
Must stop.
At least I went to the gym yesterday. Three miles. Will try for four today.
I guess these changes at work have hit me harder than I realized. I feel bitter and a little down about how things are around here. I’m just tired of it and have no motivation.
At least I don’t think about it when I leave. I guess the bitterness comes out when people actually ask me to do stuff. Otherwise I don’t care. If I can get away with doing virtually no work – or a lot of personal stuff – and get paid for it, so the better.
Maybe I just need some more caffeine and another good workout. At least the rest of life is sweet. :)
03
Mar 08
Much weirdness
There is much weirdness going on here at work today.
To recap, late last week we found out that five out of ten team members are being moved to another team. Our boss, who is a horrible micromanager with terrible judgement (ie, he wanted to kick off our sales presentation in Vegas with a Bush impersonator introducing our team – yes, FOR REAL) went around to each of us to tell us what was happening, but we never had a team meeting.
He set one up for this morning, but when I got here discovered that it had been canceled. Apparently he’s sick with the flu and will be out till Thursday.
Umm, how does he know he’ll be sick till exactly Thursday? “I’m scheduled to be well . . . now.” Anyone else would have said, “I have the flu, I’m definitely out today and tomorrow, maybe I’ll be back on Wednesday.”
Other dirt I got from my boss’ admin, who is also my friend:
- He had a meeting with a VP in human resources on Friday. It must have been important because he was off-site and drove back into the city just to have this meeting.
- Tomorrow he has a “personal and confidential” meeting on his calendar.
- Today at 5 what was our whole team has a meeting with the Senior VP of our group. That is, our whole team minus our lame boss, who although ill could have easily called in.
Those in combination with the scheduled out sick thing makes for much weirdness around here.
What I’m hoping is that they’ll fire him or at least move him elsewhere in the company, and that we all end up reporting to someone else. Second best would be if I got a new job. Third best would be if I got canned because the severance package is sweet.
Worst would be if things remain the same.
I’m excited by the shake up. I kept thinking nothing was ever going to change unless I got a new job. The only annoying thing is that one co-worker who has been moved to the other team is starting to transition her stuff to me, although I’ve gotten zero direction regarding what projects I’ll be taking on, or if I’ll even have a job, or what my job will look like.
In other news, my weekend was very nice. Saturday morning I met up with YP to do our monthly photo assignment. This is just for fun and way to get us out there and taking pictures. Back in January we made up several “themes.” Last month it was Reflections, ie, taking pictures of anything with a reflection. This time it was I Spy. In other words, “A is for. . .,” “B is for. . .,” which I’ve noticed quite a bit on Flickr. It was fun though I got only as far as K. YP got to J.
But before that we had breakfast at Cafe Habana, where I inhaled steak and eggs, and had a celebrity sighting: Ian Wright from Globe Trekker! He is probably my favorite host, along with Megan and Justine. The other hosts are sort of annoying. Ian was with a bunch of other Brits, and looked a bit older than he does on TV, or maybe I just tend to catch earlier episodes. He was wearing an orange sweater with a hole in the elbow, which made him seem down to earth.
That night MB and I saw Jar City, a crime thriller out of Iceland. It was really good. Kind of reminded me of Seven but less gruesome. The grossest thing was what Icelandic people eat – yuck, sheep’s head! (I couldn’t find a link directly to sheep’s head, but here is one on Icelandic cuisine, which apparently also includes cured ram testicles and putrified shark. Mmm, rotten shark meat.)
Another funny thing was that I was freezing in the theatre, and then to see the Icelandic landscape with everyone walking around in giant sweaters and parkas just made me feel colder.
Sunday MB and I did some work, then walked around the city. Although it’s warmer, it’s still quite windy. I’m tired of the cold; I hope it’s on its way out.
04
Dec 07
Can’t resist a food meme
Stolen from Running42K.
1. How do you like your eggs? Over medium. If scrambled, runny.
2. How do you take your coffee/tea? Good coffee: bit of sugar. Bad coffee: milk and sugar. Tea: black.
3. Favorite breakfast food?
Weekdays: mashed up boiled egg with bit of mayo (guess that would be an egg salad) on wheat toast/biali/English muffin.
Weekends: Lately it’s been a croque madame, which is a croque monsier with an egg on top.
Oh and coffee. Coffee coffee coffee, perferably a mocha. I know that’s not food but imperative at breakfast.
4. Peanut butter – smooth or crunchy? Smooth.
5. What kind of dressing on your salad? Honey dijon.
6. Coke or Pepsi? Diet Coke.
7. You’re feeling lazy, what do you make? Instant Korean noodles with tofu and some kind of leafy veggie.
8. You’re feeling really lazy. What kind of pizza do you order? Depends on my mood. Right now? Plain.
9. You feel like cooking. What do you make? Some kind of easy stirfry. (Even when I feel like cooking, I’m still lazy.)
10. Do any foods bring back good memories? Tons! I’ll pick one:
McDonald’s fish filets. Yes, my mom is an excellent Chinese cook and made tons of good food, but the tartar-covered, trans fat laden seafood-product sandwiches give me the warm and fuzzies. Every Saturday after Chinese school, we were treated to Micky D’s for waking up early on a weekend to do something we absolutely hated. Top it off with a cement-thick vanilla milk shake and I was in heaven.
11. Do any foods bring back bad memories? Italian subs. Got awful food poisoning from one when I was 12.
12. Do any foods remind you of someone? Barbecued chicken feet remind me of my dad, not because of any resemblance, but because it’s one of his favorite dim sum dishes which he always pushes me to try, no matter the hundreds of time I’ve refused.
13. Is there a food you refuse to eat? See #12. Also sea cucumbers (blech!).
14. What was your favorite food as a child? See #10. Also bologna sandwishes with lots of mayo. Hmm, tartar sauce, mayo, do we see a theme here?
15. Is there a food that you hated as a child but now like? Cheese, tofu, and cauliflower, which I love now but which sound disgusting together.
16. Is there a food that you liked as a child but now hate? Frosted Flakes. Now a bowl of it will send me into a diabetic seizure.
17. Favorite fruit and vegetable: Japanese pears and my mom’s stirfried broccoli.
18. Favorite junk food: any salty snack – chips, Cheetos, Fritos, Doritoes, apparently anything that ends in “o’s.”
19. Favorite between meal snack: Yogurt followed by something crunchy/salty like almonds, low-fat chips, or popcorn.
20. Do you have any weird food habits? See #19. Whenever I have something sweet, I need a salty chaser.
21. You’re on a diet. What food(s) do you fill up on? Yogurt and almonds. (I’m always on a diet.)
22. You’re off your diet. Now what would you like? See #18.
23. How spicy do you order Indian/Thai? Medium.
24. Can I get you a drink? Plain old water. Vodka tonic if I’m feeling nasty.
25. Red wine or white? Red.
26. Favorite dessert? I don’t have a specific favorite dessert, though I always like key lime pie, and lately I’ve been enjoying sesame-flavored sweets (pudding, gelato, etc.).
30
Nov 07
Evil tea
So this tea really works.
Usually I like the Get Gorgeous, but Whole Foods didn’t have it the other night it so I grabbed Get Some Zzz’s instead for my caffeine-free nighttime fix. I assumed it to be plain herbal tea, but it contains valerian, an herbal sedative.
I told this to MB, who brushed it off. “Herbal,” he said, “equals bullshit.”
I don’t know about that, but I had a mug and was totally sleepy afterwards. I just assumed it was partly psychosomatic, and partly because I’m sensitive to that kind of thing.
MB is about twice my size, so I thought even if it worked, it probably wouldn’t have any effect on him. But the next thing I knew he was totally dropping off.
“This tea is evil,” he mumbled before losing consciousness.
Mmm, evil herbal bullshit tea.
24
Sep 07
All vegetarians must convert now
As per my Saturday post, I had a mellow day. Was going to leave the house at 11, but then I got totally swept up in a So You Think You Can Dance marathon on MTV. Left at 1.
My goal was to walk down to the office so that I could print some stuff out. On my way, I stopped at the Gap and got some new jeans. My current favorite ones are starting to get torn up. I have another pair that’s too big, and another that is sometimes too small (they currently fit but after last night’s dinner, which I’ll get to in a minute, they might not for much longer).
Also stopped in Clark’s and got some brown boots. Yay! My old ones are really worn out and uncomfortable. I think I’ve gotten some good use out of them. These new ones should last a long time (at least I hope so given the price tag).
Wanted to run 8 miles, but I was totally pooped after 6. I think I was going a little faster than I usually do, and also it was quite humid.
Sunday I left the house early and went to write my my favorite Starbuck’s. Then In the afternoon I met up with YP to see a free taping of Showtime at the Apollo in Harlem.
It was an interesting first-time experience. I had had the impression that all of it was amateur, but the first half was an apparently well-known singer neither of us had heard of, a comedian, and this child prodigy jazz pianist.
Unlike on American Idol, all of the amateurs could actually sing, and the boo’ing from the audience seemed not so much about talent but taste (ie, the whiter the music, the louder the boos). And then after the boo’d performer was kicked off the state – by a spastic, tapping Savion Glover look-alike – the host would mercilessly make fun of said of performer.
It seemed mean to me, but, let’s face it, no meaner than American Idol or any of those shows.
Afterwards we went to dinner at Spoonbread near Columbia, a sort of hole-in-the-wall Southern place. The only real Southern food I’ve had is the spread SG’s mom made at a party years ago, and at that time I couldn’t get enough. Since then I haven’t had anything to write home about.
The Spoonbread dishes – southern fried chicken, jerk chicken, and Louisiana catfish are just a few examples – were all under $16, and came with 2 sides and corn bread. YP got a veggie spread, which was actually more like a carbalicious spread (mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, and black eyed peas), while I got the “falling off the bone” short ribs. We also got the Spoonbread punch, which is light and fruity.
We sort of had to wait a long time for the food. Neither of us minded, between the view of Central Park and our waiter’s bodacious booty. (You could bounce quarters off that thing.) When our entrees arrived, bodacious booty and all, it was well worth the wait.
Everyone who is a vegetarian must convert back to meat-eating RIGHT NOW in order to try the short ribs at Spoonbread. Melt-in-your-mouth tender and subtly flavored (ie, not too salty). My two sides were the mac and cheese, which was also delish, and the collard greens. What better way to eat your veggies than with pieces of pork?
I was only able to dig through half of the sizable portion. I could have eaten more, just for the taste, but wanted to save room for dessert. Red devil’s food cake for YP, peach cobbler for me.
Again, the food took a long time coming out, prompting jokes like, “What are they doing? Baking the cobbler from scratch in there?” but they may well might have been. Piping hot, melty, fresh, and not too sweet. Just the looks of our dessert made the young girls at the next table turn around and practically bury their noses in our plates. Mmm, sanitary.
Tonight I get to relive the whole experience as I go facedown in my leftovers.
04
Sep 07
Naked Dinner
Beautiful weather made for an outdoorsy weekend. Of course “outdoorsy” here means running in Central Park and hanging out at various other little parks in the city, reading and writing.
On Saturday I did something out of the ordinary. YP suggested the Naked Comedy Showcase at The Pit downtown. Like literally buckwild naked. Why, you may ask? Why not?
First we met for dinner in Madison Square Park at the Shake Shack, renowned for their burgers and the seemingly endless wait. We stood in line for what must have been 45 minutes, and then another 20 after we placed our orders. We’re talking burgers and fries here people, not souffles. They need a better system. I ended up taking mine to go.
I was going to eat in the theatre, but suddenly it didn’t seem right chowing down with naked people in such close proximity. As we walked in, this old guy, whom I thought from the back was a woman, was disrobing side stage. He had an awful body, totally saggy and gross. I thought we’d be subjected to watching him perform, but he just wanted to get naked. (Audience members were free to strip down if they wanted. Clothed on the left, unclothed on the right. Wide berth around the saggy naked guy.)
Two takeaways from last night: people’s bodies can be really weird, and people can be extremely unfunny, whether naked or not. Only one guy had a decent body, this really tall Texan with a nice caboose. Toot toot!
The audience was mostly made up of friends of the performers. Then there were me and YP, two single women, and two single men. For some reason only the men seemed sleazy to me. Maybe cuz the women were well-groomed and put together while the men looked like they hadn’t seen a shower in days.
Afterwards we returned to the park so that I could eat. Even cold the burgers and fries were good. By the time I was done, YP was hungry again so we got back on line, much shorter wait this time. I got a vanilla custard, which was something like heavier, creamier soft serve.
On the train ride home, the weirdest thing happened. At my stop I got up and went to the door. Then I felt this man staring at me. I glanced down at him: disheveled white guy with bug eyes. He looked away when he realized I had seen him. But that didn’t stop his equally disheveled, redneck, bug-eyed wife from staring at me too.
I glanced at her. Stare continued. I looked at her again, this time with a WTF? expression, and she finally turned away.
Walking to my apartment, I kept thinking, Do I look weird? At home I checked the mirror: nope, still Asian. Welcome to America, land of the 45-minute burger, unfunny naked comedy, and yes an Asian American woman who will stand near you on the train.
25
Jun 07
A D.C. weekend
“I’m sorry I have to pee.”
On Friday the train ride down was semi-nice. It was sort of crowded, and unfortunately I got stuck with a snotty seatmate, ie, when I had to get by her to go to the bathroom – very politely saying, “Excuse me” – she stared at me like it was a huge inconvenience. Hey, you pick an outside seat next to someone, that’s the risk you’re gonna take.
Still, I was afraid to go to the bathroom again. I waited till my bladder was near-bursting, then did gymnastics to get over her without her having to move.
SG picked me up at Union Station, and after dropping off my stuff, we had a delicious dinner of of wood fire pizza at Ella’s Pizza. I had the four-cheese one – sometimes I feel like I can eat cheese all day long – and we ended up getting free dessert.
The manager had very kindly asked if we could move tables so that he could put two two-persons one together to make one four. It wasn’t a big deal since there was an empty two-person right behind us. Plus chocolate pudding on the house! Woohoo!
That’s a damned good breakfast roll.
I told SG the one thing I wanted to do was to visit the Amish market we went to last time. It was funny because she had been thinking she needed to go there but that I wouldn’t want to.
Saturday mornings, the place gets pretty crowded, but the food is oh so very good. I had a vanilla latte and this bacon, egg, and cheese breakfast roll. Let me make this clear: it was no ordinary breakfast roll. The outside was made out of this pretzel dough that is at once salty and sweet, not to mention buttery, and the ingredients were all good and fresh and the perfect melted-ness and temperature. I wish I had one right now.
Getting crafty
Later that afternoon we went to SG’s friend’s T-shirt stenciling party. I haven’t done arts and crafts since junior high when I made a pillow in the shape of a surf board (don’t ask) so I was a bit nervous.
When we walked in, everyone was already hard at work, heads bent over stenciling like they were taking the SATs. Someone very quickly explained the how-to’s, which to us sounded like, “Blah blah blah, exacto knife, yadda yadda yadda, iron, etc etc, paint.”
I realized the print out I brought was way too complicated, and opted for a very simple graphic instead. SG finished hers first, and seeing the stencil in action, I finally got it.
It was pretty fun. In three short hours, I made one shirt with an octopus that kind of looks like an alien, and another with a row of penguins. I want to add to the octopus shirt – perhaps other sea creatures as one of the more experienced T-shirt makers suggested – and fix the penguins with another coat of paint.
Please excuse me while my mouth burns down.
Saturday night we went to this Korean restaurant that SG has been wanting to try. Overall the food was excellent. SG got bibimbap, while I had a spicy beef soup. While for some reason I could handle the soup, the seafood pancake we shared was almost unbearably hot. The pajeans I’ve had are usually mild.
A funny thing happened on the way to the library.
While we were driving around on Saturday, I told SG my possible plans for a career change, among them getting a degree in library science.
At one point we drove past the convention center and saw these sort of nerdy looking folks still wearing their nametags on the street (which I do at conventions as well, then wonder how complete strangers know my name).
The next morning SG found out that it was the American Library Association’s Annual Conference. Weird!
Now before anyone protests about librarians and nerdiness, I have one thing to say: evening wear and birkenstocks.
Yeah.
08
Apr 07
Early weekend recap
This has nothing to do with the weekend, but things have been very strange at work. Our team – which at its peak had 30 people and is now down to less than half – is being restructured. Rumor has it that other teams will be combined with ours but we don’t know how it will look or who will be doing what.
Apparently the structure was approved last week but we still have yet to hear. We’ve a feeling that another department with whom we work closely – and who in a way we suppport – already knows. A co-worker and I had meetings with some of the senior management on something else, and they were all like, “The Big Boss praised both of you by name. Hang in there, it’ll be okay, just hang in there.”
Hunh? I for one am usually invisible to senior leadership. I’m a worker bee that has a lot of contact with middle management but my work is rarely recognized by those above. So it was very very weird.
Anyway, aside from that, had a nice active weekend. Friday was our first half-day Friday of the spring/summer. I worked till about 3 – so not really a half day but a short one at least – then hit the gym. Didn’t run that much this week. Nothing on Monday, elliptical on Tuesday, three miles on Wednesday, ellipitcal again on Thursday, and finally 4 miles on Friday.
I was meeting PL downtown at 7 so I didn’t have quite enough time to run errands AND go home. So I just went home and chilled for an hour before heading back out.
This time I actually made it in time for the literary reading. I’ve missed all but one, arriving just 10 or 15 minutes late. This was a good one. Sometimes the (annoying) personality of the writer overwhlems the reading, but not this time.
Afterwards as usual PL and I had dinner at Paladar, “pan-Latin.” This time I had chicken empanadas and sopes, “corn tarts with black beans, avocado salsa & cotija cheese.” Delish!
PL and I had a really good talk. I forget how nice it is just to jibber jabber about the details of my life, like I did in college. I’ve been so reticent for so long, thinking that was the way I had to be. It’s really helpful to get someone else’s point of view.
Saturday morning I wrote and then met SB for lunch and shopping. Got some “delicates” at the Gap as well as finally found some black khakis I like from the Loft. They were full price but I’ve been on a search for some time.
I thought I’d go straight downtown and finish running errands before meeting up with YP, but I was pooped! Went home and chilled for a couple of hours. Even did some housekeeping.
Met up with YP for a quick bite to eat before going to see the stupidest movie perhaps that ever was, Premonition. I had heard some negative reviews but went to see it thinking that maybe it’d be a little stupid but at least entertaining. No: just stupid. STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID.
WARNING: Spoilers to follow if you are so stupidly inclined to see this movie.
I totally bought into it at first, expecting a weird time traveling-twisted reality thing, a la Memento or something like that. No. No explanation for why she experienced her days out of order. I mean, was she psychic? Was there a rift in the time-space continuum? Was she insane?
The first thing that set me off was the funeral. She doesn’t believe her husband’s body is in the casket and so wants to see it. Okay, I buy that. The guys struggle with casket as the funeral director is warning her that in the accident there was a “severe cut,” and then THE GUYS DROP THE CASKET! Oops! And guess what? Her husband’s head comes rolling out.
I couldn’t stop laughing after that.
And later when you finally see the accident, yes, it’s apparent he gets decapitated, but there’s also like the biggest explosion and fireball ever. How did he have any uncharred body parts left?
I could go on and on, but I won’t.
HEREBE END OF SPOILER WARNINGS
Yesterday I also picked up issues one and two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 8. I felt like such a nerd walking around with a Forbidden Planet bag, but I’m a total sucker for Buffy.
Today I need to write more, return a shirt to the Loft, buy some Brita filters, and go to the bookstore. Also need to clean the bathroom and kitchen. Maybe I’ll get a bulletin board from the Container Store. ES gave me an awesome Angry Little Girls calendar and I want to put it up by my desk.
03
Apr 07
Weekend update, a day late
So what happens the moment I do a “gorgeous” skin update? I get a pimple. That’s right: a big fat one above my lip. Sexy.
ES came in late Friday night and as usual we stayed up talking. The next day we had a hard time getting out of the house, not leaving till about 1 to meet AY downtown. We had a late lunch at Ruby Foo’s – pad thai, yum! – and then were hoping to get theatre tickets, but the line was ridiculously long. So instead we walked around.
At one point AY was dying for coffee. I tried taking us to Fauchon but forgot where it was and took us the wrong way. So we ended up at David Burke’s in Bloomingdale’s. I thought it’d be overpriced, but it was actually a good deal.
I was the only one starving so I got a bowl of chili for $14. Expensive but whatever. It was GINORMOUS. I asked for 2 small bowls and we each had a hefty serving. So three chilis for $5 a piece. Not bad. Oh, and we got free popovers as well. Everything tasted really good.
After that we headed back uptown and hung out with SB, her hubby, and little Ellie, who was ecstatic to have “Mommy’s friends” around.
The next day ES, SB, and I went to see the Orchid Show at the New York Botanical Garden.
The show of course was lovely and gave me the oppourtunity to pick up my recently little-used camera.
This might be my fave although there aren’t any flowers:
On our way back, we unfortunately just missed a train, and had to wait around for an hour for the next one. Luckily ES had some extra bagel and lobster salad from lunch. For dinner we hung out at SB’s place, ordering burgers and fries.
ES left Monday morning. Boohoo! But little does she know I’ll be visiting her later this month or next. :)
~ ~ ~
Writing class last week was good. I had my second piece – the second part of a longer work – workshopped. Again, everyone liked it and had constructive criticism.
Before class I went into a cafe to get something to eat and the teacher was there. He said, “It’s good,” and I was like, “Oh, the food’s good?” He meant my piece. Looking forward to class again this week. It’s nice to talk about literature and writing and art.
Next Friday, 4/13, I’m going to the Third Annual New York Round Table Writers’ Conference. Last year I only went on Saturday but, like last year, the better discussions are on Friday so I’m taking the day off.
I LOVE this event. I love getting a coffee early that morning and sitting there listening and getting jazzed from the caffeine and the inspiring things other writers have to say. Of course there are the idiots in the audience with their idiotic questions, but whaddya gonna do.