dining disappointment

saturday morning had plans to meet up with VK and Q2 for a tea tasting at sympathy in a kettle on astor place. . .VK got a little sidetracked and so i sat outside waiting. sitting there in the sun and gradually feeling more and more dehydrated and hungover, i was feeling pretty miserable. by the time VK actually met up with me, i was dying to get some food and h20 in my system to balance out all the alchohol. a yummy ham and cheese crepe and a couple glasses of water helped a bit.

VK and i had some success with shopping. . .i got two pencil skirts for work. VK got a nice top and dress for work.

afterwards, nels and i met up at pearl river mart to buy fabric and miscellaneous stuff. after agonizing for an hour of what fabrics to pick, looking at knives and woks, and picking up a few vases for work, we headed out to chinatown for dinner.

i have been hearing good things about doyer, a vietnamese restaurant on doyer street. i was immediately thrown off when all i heard was cantonese coming from the wait staff and manager and the fact that most of the diners were non-vietnamese. we ordered goi cuon, canh chua- sweet and sour soup with fish, and squid stirfried with lemongrass. all in all, the food was decent but not spectacular. . . but i might have to give the restaurant a second chance and try ordering some of their other dishes. . sigh, i do miss san gabriel. . .

sunday i enjoyed the nice weather and did a 7 mile run. in the afternoon i fought my way through trader joes. damn that place is a zoo. . i had to channel my inner buddha to not get angry with the other customers. . they really need to do something about the lines. it's impossible to shop there because the check out line wraps around half the store.

my dinner plans with Q2 got postponed for sunday night so i called up george to see what he was up to. we decided to grab dinner at the lodge on grand and havemeyer then go to zebulon, a jazz/live music venue in willie-b that i've been meaning to check out for ages. lodge, designed like an alpine ski loft, seemed promising. george ordered the fried chicken and i ordered the hanger steak. we chatted and waited for what seemed like ages. one by one, the tables around us were served their food before us. after forty five minutes of waiting, george called a waiter over and asked what was taking so long. the waiter explained that the fried chicken normally takes half an hour as they make it from scratch. they bring us some bread with olive oil. our waitress finally comes over and offers to give us an appetizer on the house. another fifteen minutes go by and george calls another server over and asks when our order was placed in the kitchen. the server says that it was places ten minutes ago. . . by now, both george and i are pretty upset and decide to walk out. the waitress offers to comp our meal but we leave any way to make our point. this was the first time in my life that i've ever walked out of a restaurant. the situation could have been handled a lot better by the wait staff. i normally try to be laid back when it comes to eating out in a restaurant, i've worked in a restaurant before and i know it is a tough job. . . but our waitress made two mistakes, she did not check on us and our order to make sure everything was okay. and once she did, she avoided dealing with us rather than stepping in and apologizing early on.

needless to say, i will never go back to the lodge again.