Eating through my birthday

The rest of my birthday weekend went pretty splendidly. I received a lot of wonderful gifts including some awesome picks from my Amazon wish list, as well as some brilliant thoughtful surprises. And I pretty much ate my way through my birthday. Starting with breakfast with Linda:

Lunch with Nana and Velina:

Take-out with Velina, while catching up with some DVRed shows, like the Tina Fey SNL:

Featuring my new favorite wheat beer from a friend at work:

On Sunday the foodfest continued with lunch with Nana and Velina at Ajisen Ramen:

Enjoyed the new sea salt coffee at 85 degrees C:

And was even treated to a delicious lunch of salad, soup, and watermelon agua fresca (the best!) at Native Foods today:

Needless to say it was an awesome and delicious birthday weekend.

Birthday kick-off

My good friends at work surprised me with a renovated office to kick off my birthday weekend:





I was drinking it all in--which part was my favorite? the blacked out windows with stars? the disco ball? the hanging records? the wall COVERED in awesome 70s albums? Then I saw this note:

And followed instructions:




Yes, I even wore the wig and boots when I went to pick up the company's catered lunch from KogiBBQ. This is me with Big E (he's one of the managers of the KogiBBQ trucks) with the Naranja truck:

And for the rest of the day, rickets be darned, I worked by the soft glow of my disco ball (which by the way, is also a pinata which I will break on my next sweets emergency--my friends thought of EVERYTHING!):


After work, Nana and I had the pleasure of watching the girl pass her TKD test, including this board break:

The evening was capped off with karaoke (sorry didn't nab any pictures...yet) and my new fave--StickiPicki!

Since I didn't get any one's permission at the time of writing this post, identities have been blocked to protect the innocent!
Pretty awesome way to kick off the weekend, right? I'm grateful to everyone for their gifts (of time, talent, spirit, and generosity)--they made this one of the most special and memorable birthdays!

I have got to get my mojo

I am seriously lacking focus and mojo right now. My To Do is a soul-crushing monster. Help me, Tom Cruise. Help Me Shiloh.

Yet I managed to find time reading this:

And though I didn't finish the book, I went to see the movie. Holy crap. Apparently the original title of the book in its original Swedish language was "Men Who Hate Women". That title is much more accurate given how much violence was depicted against women in the movie. I can't say, however, that it was a bad movie. I'd like to give a more in-depth review but my reflexive grade is a B.

I also got hooked playing "Words with Friends" on my iPhone regularly. Very regularly. It's like playing Scrabble at your pace--love, love, love it.

The bonus distraction was catching West Side Story on AMC:

Rita Moreno is gorgeous perfection in this. And BTW, she is one of the few people who can claim EGOT honors: she has won the Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony Awards. Love her and pretty much want to be her:

I love the choreography and music. And yes, I cry at the end. And pretty much cry whenever I hear "Somewhere".

Okay the weekend is upon me. Hopefully there are no awesome movies playing on cable. Wish me luck on tackling my monster.

Well I showed her

My sweet friend loves this oatmeal from Starbucks.

I got her two days of it.

Ha! Gotcha, lady.

Sweet surprise

Earlier this week I received this from my RAKY friend here at work:

It's delicious Haribo bears and chocolate from Germany. Look close--it's really from Germany!

Achtung Deliciousness!

Done.

E-filed with a day to spare!

Taxes!

Holy crap! Does anyone else still have to do their taxes!

GAAAAAAAHHHHHH!

another 3 weeks

Despite the encouragement from my last 3 weeks, these 3 weeks were much weaker in comparison. The most frustrating part: I gained back the weight! From 153 to 157! Arrrghhhhhhhh! Darn you, delicious Easter candy!

Also, I only accomplished two resolutions:

1) Finally got my car washed.

Actually I had planned on washing it myself but at $13 and 20 minutes of my time, I could not argue against the value of having it done much faster and more thorough than me. They vacuumed and wipe down the interior, for goodness sakes. Win.

2) Donated another bag/box of stuff to Goodwill.

Disappointing, I know. I'll do better next time.

Snuggie

My daughter recently won this in a raffle at a cat show:

She wanted me to try it on and I obliged. As I sat on the couch, draped by this Snuggie, I told the girl, I'm pretty sure I feel my dignity getting sucked out by this thing.

The girl sighed, only if you wear it public, Mom.

Snippets from the weekend

Besides Easter, one of the highlights was seeing this guy (Oli, Oli, Oli!):

while hanging out and chatting with his mom, my friend Linda. Soundbite:

Linda: Hey I'm thinking of watching this show, Torchwood.
Me: Really? What's it about?
Linda: I'll pull it up (clicks Wiki page). It's sci-fi...by the BBC--
Me: Nerd alert...
Linda: Hey, check this out--it's made by the same guys who did Doctor Who--
Me: Whoop! Whoop! WHOOP!

Hee, actually I credit Linda for exposing me to some quality programming like Mad Men, The Big Bang Theory...and even Dr. Who--at least the ones with Christopher Eccleston (rawr!).

Another highlight was celebrating my friend Heidi's birthday. We ate at Famous Dave's BBQ in Long Beach and enjoyed some delicious cake back at her house.

I'd say the possible lowlight was the tremors we got from an earthquake in Mexico. Not being raised in an area where such tremors are common, I usually go through this thought process:

Hey is it shaking? Yeah, it's shaking. That's weird. Is it a truck passing--or an earthquake? Hmmm...yeah, I bet it's an earthquake...I wonder if I should--

And by then, the tremors have stopped. Apparently there are two schools of thought of what to do when inside a building during a quake: 1) take cover in some load-bearing door frame or table, perhaps figuring out some "triangle of life" shelter and 2) the intuitive desire to get out. Interestingly enough, the two deaths reported immediately after the quake were 1) a man who died when his house collapsed on him and 2) a man who was run over by a car when he ran out of his house during the quake.

In my short history of living with these tremors, I have experienced the majority during the night--I can count on one hand how often I've felt tremors during the day (this one included). In any case, during the Easter day tremors, I found myself in the least advantageous place--in the restroom. You'd think that it would be the best place to be when experiencing mild panic. It's not. Because though my usual earthquake thought process doesn't include fear of death, this time my mind added a short plea to the powers that be to not let me die on the toilet. Thankfully, my Easter weekend were capped with these prayers answered. And Easter trail mix!

I'm Sorry Spartans

You should be playing tonight for the NCAA championships.

I let you down. I totally jinxed your Semi's game by watching it. Due to other commitments, I hadn't watched any of your games in this year's tourney. And even though I knew I wouldn't be able to watch the whole game, I started watching your game against Butler. I should have realized it's all or nothing. Or that your victories were not for my mortal eyes to witness. When I found out that you lost 52-50 to Butler later that evening, I realized my mistake.

I'll do better next year.

Happy Easter

I put together an Easter basket for the girl:


I didn't want to make it all candy (since we've already been eating so much of it), so I put other stuff--flip-flops and fun socks from Target, a kid's video camera I got for $17 from Woot, and a small collection of chocolate.

Interestingly enough, the girl also wished aloud that I would put together an egg hunt for her and her friend. I was game and I decided, instead of hiding a bunch of eggs in my messy abode, to put a series of clues leading from one egg to another to finally a collection of goodies at the end. I made two sets of clues, one for her friend:


and one for my girl:


And each set led to a collection of goodies at odd places:


Each was a small bowl with Easter candy:


with a pair of socks that matched:


Hope everyone had a great Easter!

Hoppy Fool's Day

So for April 1, a friend at work came to me with the desire to do something at the office. As some of you know by now, I'm pretty much always up for some infiltration art. We came up with an Easter-theme for some offices:


and some cubicles:


Besides, the dead bunnyman's outline, we also decorated the desks. My friend had cut out all the rabbit decorations and gotten a bunch of eggs and grass--this was one of my favorite displays:


In the end, we gave everyone in the office a candy-filled egg wishing each one a "Hoppy Fool's Day". It took a few extra hands and bodies (who choose to remain anonymous as of this post) but I think worth the effort, KWIM? Folks called me out saying this had me written all over it (though, like I said, this was initiated by someone else)--perhaps I need to change my approach. Hmmm, what would Banksy do?

Sweet P

A very sweet coworker, who I'll call Sweet P, surprised me with a red bean bun and bread loaf from 85(degrees)C bakery, a bakery/coffeehouse famous from Taiwan. The line is usually out the door of this place but she said she hit it at just the right time and brought back these baked goods for me:

Good gracious, these tasty goods brought me back to the Chinatown bakeries when I lived in New York over a dozen years ago--it practically brought tears to my eyes. You know that scene in Ratatouille when the food critic tastes the titular dish and he has an immediate flashback to the comfort of the food as a child that it brings a tear to his stern face? It was like that. The bread is slightly sweet with a slightly chewy yet light texture--it's kind of a light dessert rather than sandwich bread, a kind of cotton candy of breads. And red bean buns are one of my all-time favorite desserts and this one did not disappoint--a generous amount of sweet red bean filling inside a chewy, moist, subtly sweet bun. Soooooo good.

Well, it happened to be her birthday this month so I decorated a jar (appropriately titled "sweet" and filled it with awesome Nerds jelly beans. The Nerds coating really make them extra delicious.

Sweets for the Sweet!

Two Boots

I happened to be in Target for Easter candy shopping and I came across their Liberty of London line. I love, love, LOVE the graphics. They have some clothes which I adored but were made for bodies more mature than my daughter's and a lot less heavier than mine. So I settled on some rain boots:

I think they make the outfit much more fetching, right?

And yes, I got a pair for myself:

And we wore them yesterday, the one "rainy" April day (or at least it was forecasted) here in Southern California.

It's April 1