Saturday, July 31, 2010

Paper Anniversary

Today is our first anniversary.

I hadn't thought much of it, but I guess it was in じゅるる's mind... and we had made a date of going to see a movie + dinner, minus Popo.

So that part was all planned out... but じゅるる warned me on Thursday that he had a card & a "something" for me for our anniversary.

See, he has to warn me... or I won't prepare anything.
Am I not an anniversary type of gal or something?

Anyhoo, he gave me enough hints. Or I guessed. Or something. But I understood it was something along the lines of Skittles (which he gave me for Valentine's Day).

So I went out and got a card + a little something the next day.
I would have picked a more humorous card, but they didn't have anything that hit me. Or all the funny ones were from a third party to the anniversary couple. What? Couples can't give funny cards on anniversaries?

And my little something was a bag of Poppycock.
And Mr Goodbar.
A big sized one, at that.

So today.
We went to see a movie (Inception), while Dee came to critter-sit Popo. And we ate at the food court (Lawry's Carvery). Not much of a first anniversary date, but we're a no frills kinda couple anyway.

After we came home, じゅるる told me to open the glove compartment.
Inside was a card & a ring pop.
Gah! He got me!

See, I asked for a ring pop as a promise(?) ring before we got married. Or did I give it to him? Yeah, I think it was the latter... but he paid for it himself (I didn't have cash that day).

I lost this year, but next year I'll get a super cool cheapy accessory to beat him.

Monday, July 26, 2010

SDCC 2010 Wrap Up

Day 1
Skipped out b/c of back pains.
Ate at Phil's BBQ for dinner. Yum.

Day 2
Pre-paid parking is awesome. I have a feeling it's gonna sell out real fast next year, tho.

Went to couple panels, talked to a few work contacts, didn't get too many freebies.

Discovered that SDCC has a nursing station. How awesome is that?

Had tea w/ Steph & Steebu.

Day 3
Saw the "The Event" premiere. I guess I'll check it out, NBC. Even though I vowed not to watch anything except for L&O SVU, 30 Rock and Parenthood, NBC. I even stopped watching Brian Williams & watch Katie or Diane instead, NBC.

Saw Rich working at a booth.
Hung out w/ Sat & Wuken for a bit.

Had dinner w/ Laurven & じゅるる + Popo.

Day 4
Popo's first SDCC. She even got her own badge. And she was filmed by a TV crew.

We bumped into Sasami & Laurven, and rested w/ them.
Then Den + his ate & Mark came by to chat.

Drove home.
Stopped at Del Mar area to eat & rest.

The end.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Walnut Bread II

The bread machine has a feature where you can just have it make the dough.

Which is what I really wanted the bread machine for... so I can make my homemade pastries!

See, I've seen so many pictures of people making ham-and-cheese bread, corn-and-mayo bread, hotdog bread... Cookpad just makes you want to... cook. Even if you can't cook. Like me.

So I decided I'll try making walnut bread using a loaf pan.
It's easier to gift(?) a bread made in a loaf pan, you know. Doesn't look like it came out of a bread machine, see.

But our oven has issues.
Namely, it's not hot enough. And I don't know how to calibrate an oven, so that's a problem.

I figured, if the recipe says to bake at 350 degrees, I should set the oven at 400-450 degrees.

Which probably would work... but I also didn't know how long to bake for.
The recipe said 40 mins, so I thought... why not?

Wrong.

Cuz the bread... came out like charcoal.
Well, only on the outside.

The inside was perfect!
So what went wrong?

I have no idea... but it might be a while before I make a second attempt baking outside the bread machine.

So for SDCC, I ended up making another loaf using the bread machine.

PS. I forgot to take pictures of the charcoal loaf. Sorry.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Thew Out Back

So a day before SDCC, I threw out my back.

I wasn't carrying anything heavy... I was just bending down to get some undies from a drawer, when there was a sharp yet dull pain on my back.

I never experienced this before, but I kinda figured it was gikkuri-goshi. (Hm, sounds so strange to say "throw out my back" as a noun. How does that work?)

Immediately after the pain, I laid down on the bed.
I was able to get down to the first floor on my own... and Skyped to Sat & Ichigo that I threw out my back.

Ichigo came over to help me do laundry.
Then she delivered Popo to Sat, who took care of her the rest of the afternoon.

Meanwhile, I took a nap to escape from the pain... while heating my back w/ a heating pad.

I felt better the next day, only to stand up quickly from the couch & hurt my back again. I didn't know if I was gonna be OK enough to go to San Diego, but I recovered enough by noon to sit in the car. Sat drove the whole day down. Of course I skipped out going to the con center, and just hung out in the hotel vicinity.

First time in years that I'm going to SDCC & not working.
Actually, I've never gone to SDCC on my own... it was always for work. Heh.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Using PedEgg

じゅるる's been fascinated by the PedEgg, so we bought one the other day.

He tried it out & said he got a pile of dead skin inside the egg. It was like Parmesean cheese, he said.

So I decided to give it a try.
Since I wear Crocs every day, my soles get very dusty/dirty. So much so that my soles are turning quite gray-ish. The dust is embedded deep into my dry skin, that I can't wash it off... even w/ much soaking.

With that said, my pile of dead skin was... gray-ish in color. So not like Parmesean cheese.

じゅるる said his pile was chunkier too.
Mine are fine & dust-like. So I produce ash instead of Parmesean cheese.

Not that either one would taste good.

Monday, July 19, 2010

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Walnut Bread w/ Home Bakery Mini

So with all the ingredients in hand, I was ready to bake bread w/ the bread machine.

I was reluctant to start immediately... cuz I really don't like measuring.

And I don't really follow instructions, but it's really important to follow steps when it comes to baking, right?

But I realized I won't go forward unless I mess up once, so I decided to start.

Friday.
Like Sat said, I started w/ the basic white bread. But added walnuts to make a walnut bread, since you just had to chop the nuts & put them in when the machine beeps. Simple enough, eh?

Mistake #1: Never wear black when you're dealing w/ flour.
This should have been obvious, but I didn't think about it until I had flour all over. It's okay, though... you can just pat them off.

Mistake #2: Listen to Sasami when she says put a paper towel underneath, so you don't get flour all over the place.
I got flour all over the table, on the floor, on top of other things on the table. It's okay, though... you can just wipe the flour off.

Other things I should have thought about... like getting a container for the flour? I bought bulk bread flour at Sprouts, so it came in a plastic food bag. I was dumping it into a Ziplock container, but I should have something more... permanent. Will go look for sealable containers at BBB, Ross or Marshalls.

Anyway, everything went pretty good.

I put the pre-measured sugar, dry milk & salt in one container, so I could dump them all in after the flour. I also cut up the butter into small cubes, like the instructions said... and kept them on the small cutting board.

Water went in first (2/3 cup), then flour (2 cups), the sugar/milk/salt mix (1-1/2 Tbsp, 1-1/2 Tbsp, 1 tsp respectively), butter (1 Tbsp), and finally the active yeast.

I don't think I ever dealt w/ yeast before... and I didn't know they're "sticky." Like to each other. Kinda like the 砂鉄 when you put magnet in sand. It was very weird. And it was hard to measure the 1 tsp because of the stickiness.

And it says not to make the yeast touch the liquid ingredients (water?), but what about butter? It's kinda melty... I guess that's okay.

The bread came out pretty good.
Not great, but not bad either. It was good toasted.

Saturday.
We decided to make another batch for Saturday morning, since we had eaten most of the bread on Friday. This time, I was to attempt the "soft" bread setting.

It's like more water, extra all purp flour, more sugar, more dry milk.

This time, we didn't hear the beep to add the walnuts (it's supposed to beep 30 mins in), so we added the walnuts after the first knead was done. Oh well, the walnuts will probably be clumped in one area.

The softer version was yummier!
Yes, the walnuts weren't really mixed in well, but it wasn't noticeable.

The all purpose flour was old too, but we didn't taste anything weird.

Success!

I want to try olive bread some day... they don't have a recipe in the booklet, so I'll have to research it.

And eventually the scone. Mmmmm...

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Home Bakery Prep Phase

So today's mission was to read through the bread machine manual & to go shopping for basic supplies at Sprouts.

It seems simple enough.
Measure, dump everything in, set the machine & go.

I wanted to try something I'd want to eat... like scones or tasty treats, but Sat thought I should start w/ something basic since I'm prone to messing up.

The only thing I could mess up is measuring stuff... and that is a part I'll most likely mess up. Cuz I never follow directions, really. I'm a "good enough" measurer... which doesn't work for baking.

So I decided on white bread w/ walnuts.
The trickiest part is putting in the walnuts after the beep. I don't know when the beep will sound, but I'll read up on it some more.

Anyway, since we don't have any baking supplies at our place, time to head over to Sprouts. Cuz they have a bulk foods section and they had all sorts of flour.

My list of things to buy:
* Bread flour
* Active yeast
* Baking powder (when I get to my scones)
* Dry milk
* Walnuts

What the heck is dry milk? Powder milk?
Eh, they'll have it in the store anyway, right?

So I go to the baking section... find everything but dry milk.

They have evaporated milk, but that's not dry... I text Sat to have her look it up. She says it's powder milk. But I don't see it in the shelves.

But I did locate a container of powder milk by the bulk food section. Whee!

So I have everything I need.
Maybe I'll give the bread machine a try tomorrow.

Monday, July 12, 2010

Aka Suri (Bath Scrub)

Ichigo, Sat & I went to aka suri in K-town today.
Well, Sat didn't get one b/c she volunteered to watch Popo.

Ichigo said they used to have a 2nd floor w/ resting space, which we would have been able to take turns watching Popo. But they didn't have the 2nd floor anymore.

So we soaked in the hot tub for 15 mins to loosen up our skin... then headed over to the spa area to get all our dead skin scrubbed off.

I didn't actually get to see all the skin that came off... but I haven't been able to scrub myself really well since a year ago. So I was pretty sure they were able to get a tennis ball sized amount of dead skin off of me.

I was expecting it to hurt, but it felt real good.
I think I might go get this done every 3 months... then I don't have to scrub myself clean as hard on a daily basis, right?

Saturday, July 10, 2010

35th B-day

The day started w/ many FB greetings.

And apparently Skype also says, "Shiz just turned 35!"
Gee, thanks Skype.

Sat arranged for my b-day festivities, so we had a very full day.

1pm lunch at HK Deli.
Cuz we like eating there.
I think about 15 people showed up, and we took over 1/3 of the small restaurant. And stayed there for a long time too. But the folks are always nice. We love them.

4pm obon fest at Nishi H temple.
That was what everyone voted for. But the dancing doesn't start til 6:30pm or something, so we left before the main event. Maybe next year.

Oh, we bumped into Mrs F-moto and S-ie at the obon fest.
I got to show them Popo too.

7pm karaoke, Scattergories & peach cobbler at our apt.
Dee offered to make peach cobbler (Paula Dean's recipe), so while he was slaving away, everyone else sang or played games.

The peach cobbler was yum.
I do apologize for not having enough bowls ready... Den ate out of a margarine container. We have real adult bowls, really!!

And じゅるる gave me my b-day present he's been hiding for several weeks... a bread machine!

Of course Sat was against him getting it, cuz she claims that I have a gazillion kitchen gadgets that I don't use.

We'll see how many uses we'll get out of the bread machine. It makes pizza dough though... I think we could use it for that, at least. Altho we were perfectly fine w/ Philsbury pizza dough... so would we care enough to use the bread machine?

Friday, July 9, 2010

Phoneless for a Day

So... I bought a Virgin Mobile phone at B*st Buy.

And I called to transfer (the industry lingo is "port," they say) my current AT&T number over to Virgin Mobile.

This was on Tuesday afternoon.

I was told by the VM rep to call back the next day to see if my phone number transferred over successfully.

Wednesday.
My AT&T phone was still working, so the number hasn't transferred over. But I was kinda busy, so I didn't call VM that day. They did say it could take up to 72 hours anyway.

Thursday.
The AT&T phone still works. Hmmmm.
I call VM, and the new rep told me that the transfer didn't go through because I didn't provide a password for my AT&T account.

Yes I did!

Anyway, I give it to them again.
The rep told me that he'll put an urgent ticker on my request, so it'll go through faster. I didn't really believe there's a "urgent" and "not-so urgent" for phone service transfers anyway (aren't they all urgent, since they want the sale?), but I thanked him anyway.

And today.
My AT&T phone still works. Hmmmmmmmmm.

At this point, I'm caring less and less... when I get a phone call from a private number. I answer, and it's a VM rep.

They were calling b/c the transfer request was denied again & he wanted to verify the password. I told him it's what we use online & over the phone, but I'll call AT&T to see if there is another password for phone number transfers.

I call AT&T, and the rep there told me that we did have the correct password, but for phone number transfer, the password should be a numbers-only password (the one we set up for online access was alphabetical).

So I set up a new password w/ him.
He was a very nice young man, despite the fact that I was telling him I'm changing service providers.

I call VM back again & have them send in another phone number transfer request.

After taking a nap & heading home (I was at Koge Haus), I check my AT&T phone and it doesn't work anymore.

Hurray!

No, it was too early to rejoice.
Because my VM phone doesn't work yet.

Of course, of course.
I didn't set up my plan yet.

See, I was told to call back when the phone number is transferred over, so I could let them know what plan I wanted & provide my credit card info.

I try to set up my account online.
It says my phone number doesn't exist in their dbase.

Okay, I'll give them a call.
The first rep told me that my phone number isn't in their dbase. So she transferred me over to the phone porting department to see what was up.

The second rep (from the phone porting dept) told me that my phone number hasn't ported over.

Well, since my AT&T phone is no longer working, AT&T released the number... so why can't they set up my number w/ my new phone?

So the second rep got all the info from me.
Like when the AT&T phone stopped working, my password w/ AT&T (again), how many times I've called them, etc etc.

He's putting in a request (to who? some tech dept w/in VM?) to get my number working. He said to try again tomorrow... which I replied, I'm phoneless until then!? Well, yes... and he didn't seem apologetic about that.

Do people in the world go phoneless for a day and survive these days?

Okay, I don't go out & I'm always online, so I'll probably be fine w/o a phone and all... but it still annoyed me anyway. My irritability could have been from the lack of sleep, though.

So I'm supposed to try to set up my account tomorrow.
But I'm going to be out most of the day... you know, it's my b-day and all. Sat planned a day-long activity fest geared towards... her *laugh*

I hope I can get the phone working before we head out.
Of course I can't transfer my address book from my old phone, so I'll have everyone enter their own data.

Friday, July 2, 2010

New Phone

B*est Buy emailed a 10% off coupon today.

Perfect timing!
I was planning to buy my Virgin Mobile phone there.

I got the Kyocera Loft.
It looks like a Blackberry.

Since it's a plain black phone, I'll have to find a way to personalize it. Stickers? Case? Something...

I'll activate the phone after AX.
I read online that it could take couple of days to transfer the phone number... altho Virgin's site says "1 hour or so." Hopefully it'll only take around an hour.

I get unlimited text, so feel free to text me :D
But I only get 300 minutes of talk time (no free nights/weekends) w/ no rollovers, so I can't talk for long periods of time.

Unlimited web/data too... but I don't know how that works yet, so it's hard to get excited over it. Maybe I'll even start tweeting. Gasp!