The Daily Sabs

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.

today was randall's birthday -- i've been calling it his barkday -- and to celebrate, i took him across the bridge to sushi ran. we pigged out, at least we were going to. actually we were pretty good, i let birthday boy call the shots, if it had been me we'd have eaten at least one more roll. probably two.

for his birthday i decided to get randall a copy of piero ventura's book of cities. it's an old children's book from 1975, that they recently reprinted. i took one look at it and knew that randall would love it. okay actually i saw a tiny one inch thumbnail in a magazine and knew he would love it. he's into intricate little line drawings, and well we both have a thing for kid's books.

ps. yes, that card on the table is of a dog wearing a birthday hat and driving a car. that is more or less randall's idea of awesome. (when i asked whether or not that statement was true, randall said it would only be awesomer if the dog said he was moving in and also if he could make great lattes).

pps. juju and wes got randall a pretty amazing gift courtesy of the ivory weirdo.