Start of 2011

Ichigo, Sat & Ards came over for New Year's Eve.
Yipee! All girls! Plus じゅるる. Tee hee.

Yakiniku, Kohaku & Ards Papa flan (yum!) & pumpkin pie (yum!) & chocolate torte (yum!)...

We switched to Chan 7 for the countdown... and being non-drinkers, じゅるる got pear cider/soda. Yum!

Second B-day Cake

We had a second b-day cake today.

This time it's family only.
Plus Dee.

Dee came early, so he took care of Popo all afternoon.

We had guava cake.
Man, eating cake 2 days in a row... not good on the diet. So we sent half of the leftover cake home w/ Dee, so he can share w/ his mom & sis.

And we watched Amazing Race & Celeb Apprentice together too.

Ichigo Goes to ER

First things first.
Ichigo is okay.

Now for the details.
Ichigo went down to the garage to toss out some trash. And she saw some boxes that fell over near the front of my car, so she was walking towards it when she slipped on the smooth concrete floor. And landed on her butt... and then hit her head... all in a puddle in the garage.

Neither of us were with her, so she got up and came back upstairs.
But she had a HUGE bump on her head!

We made her change.
Told her we'll take her to the ER, but she resisted at first.
But we took her anyway.

There was no line at the ER, so they let us in pretty quickly.
But we had to wait a while to see a doctor. Saw two nurses before that, though.

The doc said she looked okay, but we went ahead and took a CT scan.
Everything looked fine, they said. Whew.

We got back around 1am, so we were in the ER for about 3 hours.

Since she hit her butt real hard, she decided to take couple days off from work.

And we had to keep waking her up every 3 hours, b/c that's what you're supposed to do w/ someone with a head injury.

It goes without saying that Ichigo, Koge & I slept all day the next day.

Xmas 2009

Now that I have in-laws, we drove out to OC to visit them.
We haven't been since August... Terrible DIL? Maybe.

We had a light snack, chatted little, opened presents and left... not before stealing raw steak & croquette they had prepped for dinner. Whoops, we were supposed to eat dinner w/ them?

Well, we left early b/c we had planned on going to eat hot pot.
But we get to the hot pot place and it's really crowded. Prolly a 30-min wait, but certain people are too impatient to wait for food. So we drove to two other restaurants (shabu-shabu place, Korean tofu place), before finally agreeing to go to the cut-noodle place Sat always goes to.

Having a massive heartburn, I wasn't sure what I could eat... so I went w/ fried rice. And it was really good! じゅるる got fried noodles, and that was good too. The cut noodles are so mochi-mochi. Ichigo wanted soup & ordered hot and sour soup... like I was gonna be able to have that w/ my heartburn.

I was super sleepy when I got home and retired to go to bed... only to watch 4 hours of West Wing (4th season).

Driving Back & Forth Type of Day

Todayじゅるる and I headed to the Staples Center for a concert... only to realize that the concert was the night before. Shock!!

It kinda sucked more b/c we had paid $15 to park next to the Nokia Center.

We considered going to a show at the Nokia Center... but it was an Elmo show. Elmo as in the red creature from Sesame Street.

So we decided to head back home to WLA & hang out w/ Sat & Ards, who was visiting for B*tCon.

Then we headed to Torrance & was watching the final Leno show, when Sat called saying she had a fever... so I had じゅるるtake me back. Sat had food poisoning or something. Good thing I picked up Gatorade on the way home.

Oh, we ate mac & cheese for dinner... and the box had a sweepstakes entry information. So I went to the website, and the sweepstakes was over. At 11:59pm EST, and I went to the site around 10pm PST. Missed it by an hour!

It just wasn't our day, overall.

Skype-ing w/ Ichigo

Well, not video call.
The rental Mini Dell has a built-in camera, but I'm strictly a text chat person.

Apparently Ichigo set up Skype (who did it for her?) and has been chatting w/ her old lady friends. So I added her to my Skype contact.

Now she messages me day & night. *groan*

Ichigo asked for Sat's contact... and of course Sat said no.

Long Time No Eat, Hop Woo

Sat, Dee & I went to eat at Hop Woo.
We were planning our trip to San Jose, plus Dee helped carry in my old office chair for Sat. It's kinda big for her desk area, but it'll do for now.

I guess no one was in duck mode, so we just got regular food. Squid, fried rice, spinach & tofu, and hot & sour soup. We almost finished it all. Pigs...

Oh, Sat also ordered their one dessert. Almond flavored milk soup(?) covered in puff pastry.

At the end, the waiter gave us three fortune cookies... which would have been fine, except they gave a big table the warm dessert soup thingie. And the guy behind our table who was eating alone got orange slices along w/ his fortune cookie.

Well, the big table ordered duck.
And the guy by himself ordered lobster.

We only had poor people food, so only fortune cookies.

Gyoza Night

Sat & I have been craving gyoza for a while, so じゅるる and I went out to get ingredients and headed home to WLA.

Since we bought 2 packs of meat, we had じゅるる make one batch & Sat make another batch. The meat make-up was different too. One pack was half beef & half pork (prepared just for gyoza? Only at a Japanese market...) and the other was all pork. I forget who got pick pack, though.

Sat made her usual spicy flavored gyoza.
After cooking a batch, she added more hot sauce so the last half of her batch was really spicy.

We ended up making 2 whole gyoza wrapper packs... which means it should have been around 100 gyoza. Gefu~

Sat Birthday Dim Sum, Karaoke & Game Party

We went to dim sum for Sat's b-day.
The other twin Chris was missing (had something to do?) and nearby b-day boy Bung was away on some beemer fair. Plus a few missing souls, like Ards (errands), Panda (deadline), Wuken & Dennis (classes).

I didn't take photos during lunch, but I believe Allen did.
I don't know where he posts photos, though.

じゅるる, Steph & Vu left at this point & we headed off to karaoke.
But other twin Chris showed up, so the group grew to 10.

Then over to our place for some game playing.
Dave left at this point, but Wuken showed up. Dennis came a lot later.

We made takoyaki as snacks... but we didn't order dinner, so everyone must have been hungry. Bad host!

S Family Puppy

Today, Sat & I headed to K-town to eat soon tofu.
We were planning on eating pho w/ Dee, but he bailed out on us. Pho will have to be another day.

We went to a K-town mall first to take a look at those pressure-point hula hoops. I realized I haven't done real hula hooping in... 20+ years? Cuz WiiFit doesn't really count. And I can't hula hoop... very sad. I'm sure it's a little bit better w/ a real hula hoop, since the pressure-point ones are heavy (3 lbs).

At the restaurant, we were pleasantly surprised with a new soon tofu flavor: squid.

It contains squid strips & beef, which is perfect b/c I never liked the clams and shrimp inside the seafood soon tofu. This will be my regular now.

After dinner, we called up Dee to see if we can drop by their house to see their new puppy. So they brought out a fluffy ball of energy out on a leash.

The puppy was so excited... she peed all over the porch.
She almost got my shoes, but good thing she missed.

The puppy ran around in circles for 5 minutes, then she finally settled down and started eating dry leaves. Apparently she eats anything from bugs to squirrel poo. Just like Koge! Aww, aren't pets adorable?

Big Clean Up Day

Ichigo came over today to help us clean the living room.
We have a new delivery coming on Thursday, and we need to make room to move some furniture around.

So the living room is now completely clean.
We can have friends over again.

But I was too sleepy (had 2 hours of sleep) and Ichigo was too tired (from cleaning all day), we didn't get to start our taxes... eeep, we're running awfully close this year (last year was bad too).

No Food at Home

There isn't a lot of food at home.

Maybe cuz I haven't really been home for the last 3 weeks... but I haven't gone to the supermarket in a while. And the only thing Sat goes out to buy is pomegranate juice & yogurt from Trader Joe's.

I found cabbage & eggs, so we made野菜炒め last night... but today, there wasn't a whole lot left in the fridge.

So we called up Ichigo to have her bring food.

She brought extra steak from N (from staff who didn't eat it for lunch), and toro. Yes, that would be fatty tuna. Yum!

Koge begged and begged and begged for it.
I didn't give her any. Sat would NEVER give her any.
But we're not sure if Ichigo gave her some... but there were about 4 pieces left, so I bet she gave Koge some. Spoiled cat...

PS. All four of us (including Koge) took a nap around 3pm. And I didn't wake up until 7pm. Ack! Damn you, jet lag!!

New Box in the House

Sat's been waiting all day for the UPS man.

Around noon, there was a knock on our gate.
Sat ran to the door, but it was Dee. (He came by to help me go to storage)

Then I came back from storage around 2pm to take Zyrtec before going to Prince K's house.Sat thought it was the UPS guy. I thought he had already come by.

Then I came back around 5pm. Sat was once again disappointed that it wasn't the UPS guy.

But he still came. Around 6:30pm or so. I guess it was a busy day.

And what did he deliver?
Um... a game console I thought we'd never own. I have no idea why she got it... but to play Left 4 Dead? Please friend her on XBox Live (or whatever you do).

Back from San Jose

I'm back from my two-day, one-night trip to San Jose.

It was a tough two days without internet access.
But I did my work as a photographer for Ichigo & her friend M-san.

I also got to catch up on sleep.
Which also means that I did very little work for Sat.
Like 10 pages.

Looks like I'll be working through New Year's.

PS. Thank you Dave for picking us up.

Our Broken Microwave

Yama sisters' microwave is broken.
It's been broken for several months now.

Symptoms:
1. Food doesn't heat up.
We would stick a ball of rice in, nuke it for 2 minutes... but one side is still cold.

2. It stops.
You punch in the time & walk away... and the microwave stops with 20 seconds left. Today, it stopped after 2 seconds!

So Sat is looking for a new microwave now. But everything on Amazon.com is really expensive. I think she should ask Dave to take her to Target to buy a new one. I have a $20 gift card...

Watched Sleeping Beauty on Bluray

Sat & I were bored today so we watched the bonus disc of Sleeping Beauty.
Note that we haven't watched the main disc yet at this time.

The bonus features included a lot of making-of footage, which makes you want to see the movie.

So after spending 2 hours going through every aspect of the bonus disc, we decided to pop in the main disc.

I don't remember the last time I saw Sleeping Beauty. Sat said she saw it when she was in the 4th grade. Either way, it's been like 20 years?

The movie is gorgeous, by the way.
Although I'm bothered that I keep noticing that the colors of the birds change. From yellow to green. And yellow to orange. I'm not bothered that the colors changed, but I'm bothered that I notice these changes. What am I, an animation otaku!?

And I was checking out how much movement there is... like I said... am I an animation otaku?

No no no.
I'd like to think it's just a side effect from my job.

Oh, starting w/ Sleeping Beauty, Disney Bluray discs have a feature called Disney BD Live. I guess it connects you to their online network & you can chat with friends as you watch the same movie. So if any of you signed up for the Disney BD Live, email me your handle. Ours is our cat name, of course.

There isn't much on the Disney BD Live yet. They give you new avatars when you go into the network through your Bluray player. So our current avatar is the dragon from Sleeping Beauty. I'm not sure how the Disney Movie Rewards points work... but if Ards isn't going to sign up, maybe we'll use her Enchanted points. Heh heh.

I guess I should open my copy of Ratatouille soon.
I don't think that one is a 2 disc set though.

Duck on Turkey Day

The Yama family went to Duck House in MPK for Thanksgiving dinner.
It's our tradition to go to a Chinese restaurant every year for Thanksgiving & Christmas.

This was our first time at Duck House.
We got there early (4:30pm), and found out that the restaurant doesn't open til 5pm. So we went back into the car because it was freezing outside.

We ordered the following:
Peking duck (pre-ordered), winter melon soup, pork spare ribs & combination noodles.

The Peking duck came w/ these tortilla-like pancakes. Well, it came in a tortilla warmer container. Those plastic, flat containers that they have at nice Mexican restaurants.

Papi called it "gyoza skin"...

The Peking duck also came with green onions (usual) and cucumbers (!). It was the first time I had Peking duck w/ shredded cucumbers, and it was nice. Made it quite refreshing. I wish other places would serve cucumbers too.

The winter melon soup was quite good. It didn't have a lot of melon inside, but there was a lot of tiny pieces of shrimp & shiitake mushrooms, and it was like dropped-egg soup. But since they had made it gravy-like with cornstarch, I had to wait a long time before the soup cooled down.

Spare ribs was a bit salty. But they did cook it long enough that the meat just fell off the bones. Yum!

And the noodles were meh. It tasted good, but Papi & Sat complained that the noodles were too soft. I was also disappointed that the shrimp looked and felt (texture-wise) horrible. The meats were good, though.

Oh, oh, oh!
I forgot one last thing.

The waitresses were dressed up like maids! It's a maid Peking duck cafe! Hahaha...
I didn't have the nerve to take photos. Sorry Dee.

And there was a girl (customer) who looked like Panda. I don't think it was her, but it'd be funny if it was. Although we were sitting right by the front entrance & we were the third group who went into the restaurant... so she would have noticed us as she passed by... no?

Photos of the food?
It's on Flickr.

Trip to Torrance w/ Sat & Dee

Sat, Dee & I headed to Torrance to go to Book Off.
I had more books to get rid of, and Sat really wanted to get rid of them before the game night... so we had Dee come over and put the books into his car on Friday.

We were all hungry before we left the house, so we decided to go eat first.
We tried going to okonomiyaki/monja place Tombow, but they were no longer there. So we ended up going to El Pollo Inka.

After getting plenty fat, we headed over to Book Off to drop off the load of books. 300 books turned into $95. Not so bad. They didn't take any of the VHS tapes & books that had "sample" stamped onto them. Darn.

We stopped by Target to pick up Koge's food & litter pellets.
And we got distracted by a lot of things... because it's Target.

I bought two rolls of the $1 Christmas wrapping paper.
Then I wanted to buy the Christmas themed Ziplock bags & Gladware, but all of the sizes were waaay too big (I don't have much use for a gallon-sized Ziplock bags!).

Then I found cute melanin bowls that had monsters on them. Gah, cute!
So I bought four of them. I wanted to buy the turquoise bowls w/ circular designs, but Sat didn't like them. I thought we should have some "adult" looking bowls in the house, but Dee pointed out that I was buying bowls w/ monsters on them...

And I bought a pile of chocolates for work, since I didn't want to go buy holiday gifts for the UPS guy, mail carrier guy, the water guy, etc. during the big holiday rush. I need to buy gifts for the staff too, but I'll be buying those online.

Oh, and we bought cat food too. But no litter pellets.

They also had Ratatouille & Sleeping Beauty on Bluray for $20 each, so we bought those.
Maybe I should have bought extra copies of those for Christmas gifts. Anyhoo, I have to update my Amazon Wish List to remove Ratatouille too.

Night We All Craved Sushi

After the yard sale, I considered going to N Sushi for lunch... but since Ichigo wasn't going to be there until 4pm, I decided against it. Well, if Ichigo was there, she would pay...

But poor Dee had sushi in his head.

And when I got home, Sat wanted to eat sushi.
Probably because she was near N Sushi, but decided she was too hot & wanted to go home after helping out at the yard sale for 30 mins.

So we decided to go today.

Three of us, meeting there at 5:30pm.
We ate dynamite (mostly Dee), tempura, albacore salad, broiled squid legs, and random sushi. It came out to $48, and had Ichigo pay *laugh*

No photos, because it was our usual fare.

Sat Addicted to Word Challenge

Dave & Sat signed up for Facebook today.
I have no idea why they signed up. I thought they didn't like that sort of sites. And they're anti-social. Hermits don't belong on Facebook, yo!

Anyway, Dave started playing Word Challenge.
But he sucks at these kinds of games & couldn't get past 3k.
Sat plays, and goes all the way up to 10k (teacher/professor).

So Dave is now listed higher than Ardith, Hangyee and Ben. But he would NEVER get a score that high. I think there should be a "reset" button.

Sat is currently addicted & playing like crazy on her blue Dell.
She's going to beat my score one day. Maybe tonight.