The Daily Sabs

this afternoon a gang of us headed down to k9 playtime for jesusita's quinceanera. jesusita is burger's 15 year old teeny tiny chihuahua, and to help her celebrate her ripe old age, burger threw her a bash. that's right, we went to a dog party.

there were quite a few pups there, and proud pup owners. there were even a few impostors there (like ourselves, and annie and dylan who also do not own a dog). we watched puppies play, ate cake and sang happy birthday. chris even ate some of the dog cake (peanut butter and carrots or something like that. he said it was dry. and for the record he didn't realize it was dog cake). we also got to meet new pups like gene's dog squeegee (sorry gene for not making the illustration, i ran out of space - but if it's any consolation, your dog is the one randall wanted to steal the most).

burger's invite said to dress to impress, so randall put on his professor outfit (the long hair combed over and the beard solidifed the look), and i wore this ridiculous skirt that is normally reserved for holiday parties). some of the other folks were dressed up (not as many as i hoped) and some of the pups also were in outfits. sadly, because of a junk filter fiasco, sushi was not one of them. i was going to make her a skirt, but i thought samshrew never emailed me size restrictions. guess the internet didn't want any dog showing up the quinceañera queen.

afterwards randall and i went to a so-so open house and then ran to target. yes we were still in our ridiculous outfits.

There was nothing planned today (except a few last minute gift purchases) so I made samshrew and chris come have lunch with us. We were originally going to go to woodhouse over on market, but the wait was longer than we wanted, so we headed over to chilango instead. We said feliz navidad and chowed down on delicious food.

Afterwards we stopped for coffee and the last minute gifts (I love that I can stop at the local shops and avoid all the last minute madness). With our prizes in tow, we headed back to our house where it turned into a candy-eating nerd party. At some point Chris, samshrew, and Randall all ended up gathering around the laptop to laugh and point at things on the Internet. It was sort of a magic moment that made me smile.

This morning Randall and I woke up crazy early. Well maybe not crazy,
but earlier than normal for a Saturday and a little crazy for us. We
decided to capitalize on our earliness by heading out to brunch. We
originally wanted to checkout mama's, but the line was already too
long. So we changed gears and headed to canteen instead. I didn't
realize that they opened that early for breakfast and was pleased to
check it out (no wait at that time of day!). One word: delicious. Even
breakfast hater Randall really enjoyed it.

Afterwards we headed home where we lazed about and tried to figure out
what to do next. That's when samshrew and chris helped us form a plan.
It was pretty gender stereotyped, samshrew and I went shoe shopping
and chris and Randall stayed home and played some super secret video
games. On our way home samshrew and I stopped by red wings Korean
fried chicken to grab dinner. It's no bonchan, or kyochan, but it made
for a pretty delicious dinner. We definitely enjoyed it with a tear of
spicy.

Finally we rounded out the day with a never-ending round of Simpsons
themed monopoly. Samshrew was knocked out early and Randall gave up a
while after, leaving chris and I to duke it out. It was a long battle
but I won. We played by the official rules too and that was actually
wacky. But it worked towards my favor so yay!

I woke up this morning to a ringing telephone; it was morm calling for
no reason. We talked for nearly four hours. Afterwards it was time for
some open houses (one pretty good but not a wow), then back home to
talk to my dad. And then it was time for hot pot. We owed samshrew and
chris a dinner and chris wanted to cash in with hot pot. All you can
eat and drink for $29.99, nom nom nom.

Ps. Chris ate so much he's going to be ill all over samshrew. See?

today was an action-packed, not to mention snack-packed, day full of samshrew birthday fun. first off samshrew, chris, and sushi dog picked randall and i up for a jaunt across the bay. the east bay spca is putting on these special events all summer long, and today was a free kayaking with your puppins day. randall and i sadly don't have a puppins, so we paid our dues and rented a kayak.

afterwards (and before) we gorged on tasty treats from the jack london farmer's market (the fish tacos there = awesome). and then we headed back to the city where chris picked up a cake from his pals at Sugar Beat Sweets. we got stuck in a little bit of pride traffic (fun fact, i witnessed a cop break up a fight, and then take down a dude who wouldn't cooperate -- come on, he took a swing at the cop!), but eventually ended up at samshrew & chris's house.

we had many hours to kill (dinner reservations weren't until 8), so we snacked, played a round of life -- randall won, also it's pretty different to the version i had when i was growing up -- drank wine, and ate birthday cake. for the record, it was a vegan cake, was vanilla with strawberry, and even randall -- who is skeptical of anything vegan and normally only eats chocolate cake -- asked for a full slice. translation: it was tasty.

finally, after goofing about for a while more, we hopped into the car, miraculously found parking in the castro on pride weekend, and headed to frances for dinner. folks, i made these reservations weeks (maybe months) ago. it is the hot new must-eat at place in the city and after eating there, i can totally see why. the food was delicious, the service friendly and on top of it, and they even seated us 15 minutes early. plus, they knew it was samshrew's birthday, so they brought us out the most fantastic housemade salted chocolate cookies with humphry slocombe ice cream sandwiches in the end. oh and did i mention? they serve the house wine by the ounce. they bring a small pitcher that has ounce markings on the side, and they only charge you for what you drink. simply amazing. i can't wait to go back.

happy birthday samshrew!

Today is the world premiere of Victor Yang, chris's short film that's
screening at the la Asian pacific film festival. This is what we came
down to la for, but it doesn't screen until 10pm (with a bunch of
other shorts in a program called in the valley of love and betrayal).

This meant we had the afternoon to kill time. I had originally planned
on eating all around town, but a giant funnel cake French toast
breakfast killed that idea. So I dragged Randall to the moca instead.
They're having a retrospective of their first 30 years, and while it
was a comprehensive look, I found it somewhat lacking/boring. Maybe
I'm just hard to please. However it wasn't a total bust, we did get
this sweet photo out of it.

Speaking of sweet photos, at the pre-movie screening party, chris
showed us how delicious kyochon chicken is. Kyochon catered the party
and we frigging went nuts. We ate so much chicken, I can barely move.
Can someone explain to me why there's not one of these in San francisco?

Okay, well movie time. That's the cast and crew in the photo below.
Break a leg! (Or whatever it is you say when a movie screens for the
first time.)

Ps. I took the first photo with my regular camera but didn't have
Internet access so I took a pic of the back of the camera. Ghettostyle.

Today Randall and I hopped on a plane and headed down to LA. Chris's
film is screening at the LA Asian pacific film festival, and we
decided to come down to support. Besides we kept telling bao we were
coming to visit and a trip was long overdue.

After an afternoon of catching up, tito's tacos, and checking out
bao's place, we checked into our hotel, had a quick drink and then
went out to hunt for dinner. We didn't actually have to hunt hunter/
gatherer style, but we did cast a wide net. We originally thought we
go to sara's ham hung recommendation. But the English only menu was a
bit crazytown and Randall played the veto card. I was bummed at first,
but we went a block down to Honey Pig and my bummers went away. Honey
pig was Korean BBQ extreme complete with buzzers at the table to let
people know you need assistance. The food was pretty great, but sadly
the gimmicky pig shaped lighters they gave us at the end of the meal
was my favorite part. Honey pigs = Happy pigs!

Okay gotta go, it's time to go mingle at this really weird film
festival party.

this morning samshrew texted to see what we were up to. since the only thing for the afternoon agenda was laundry, i told her that we had nothing planned. amazingly she also had nothing planned, so we decided to all meet up and go to the beach. that sushi dog entertained us for a while, but when we got bored we left and had joe's ice cream - for the record, root beer swirl ice cream is delicious.

speaking of delicious, after beach time, randall and i came home and got ready for an early 5:30 dinner seating at baumé in palo alto. tonight was the quarterly scheelbarrow dinner (aka pitstop) and we decided to go all out and order the 15-course tasting plus wine pairing. it wasn't the most amazing meal i'd ever had, but it was definitely worth it. while i've had bits of pieces of molecular gastronomy infused meals, i'd never had one where it was the focus. i can't remember the last time i had so much fun at fancy dinner (even if it initially felt weird, stuffy, and with colorful plates out of 1997. sure it's gimmicky, but it was a blast, and luckily for us the gimmick tasted great too. plus they get bonus points for bringing us an extra dish just for photos/videos (they wanted to make sure we all ate ours right away). if it wasn't for that we never would have proof of randall the magic dragon - it was better the first time he ate it, but its still awesome, see for yourself:

okay. if i didn't make it clear earlier, i just had a 15 course menu with a wine pairing. it's time for a nap before bedtime.

but first, some random photos from today:

this afternoon, morm and beefi aiyi came for a visit. morm was here to help us make an offer on a house, but sadly it's not going to happen. not only did the place have bad feng shui in the lot layout (morm's words, i thought the lot was lovely), but the foundation had some structural issues that probably would've been a disaster in the long run. we didn't notice when we were looking at it the other day, but all the rain this weekend gave it away, plus morm pointed out the part of the disclosure package we didn't notice. total bummer though, the place is super cute, the location perfect, and the price right.

however, while the housing excursion was a bust, the rest of the evening turn out to be a lot of fun. we went out to the old mandarin islamic for a huge feast. the menu there actually said the phrase "dinner manual" on the front, but as you can tell, when morm's around there's no need for a manual. she ordered nine different dishes, plus a side of rice to battle the spicy to death dish. that's right, four people, nine dishes. needless to say, we had plenty of leftovers, so much that we brought a bunch back to samshrew (she was too busy to join us for eating).

it wasn't exactly the type of birthday randall had planned, but it turned out pretty fun, even if he didn't get a house.

ps. here's a good morm story for you. while at the restaurant she became bff with the manager lady. at one point she mentioned to the lady that i was her daughter, and the lady did the typical chinese thing where they say nice things, and said that i was pretty. mom responded with yes, but she's too chubby. while this would probably be mortifying to most, stuff like this is just hysterical to me now. the best part is that she was really loud, and the restaurant is not that big. this means everyone heard her, and i am pretty sure that everyone there spoke chinese. i know for a fact that the girl who looked at me in shock when this happened did.

pps. the phrase "yah but she's too chubby" actually sounds much nicer in chinese. plus, it follows the chinese way of not accepting a compliment without criticizing it first. it's just that usually the exchange is something along the lines of "you have a lovely house" and you responding with "thank you but really it's quite small" - so don't hold it against morm. she's just following years of ridiculous culture.