up to my ears in empanadas

k-flo and i stayed up til 12:30 last night prepping for tonight's fesitivites. she was making sangria and the cheese/fruit tray and i was making mojitos, cuban sandwiches, and empanadas.

i went to six different stores before i got all the ingredients! (thank you food emporium for the empanada wraps) i found the empanada recipe online- manchego cheese, hazelnuts, raisins, spinach, and onion. . should be good. despite not altering the recipe, there was enough filling to make 40 empanadas. to prepare for the cuban sandiwiches, i also roasted some pork in a red wine, garlic, dill, rosemary, oregano marinade. . .unfortunately i wasn't able to let it marinate overnight. . .but since the pork is just going into sandwiches i doubt it will make a noticeable difference. . my only concern is that i don't have a grill so i won't be able to press the sandwiches but will have to make do with baking the sandwiches in the oven.

as i was squeezing the nth lime for the mojitos (because the lime juice concentrate just won't do). . .i realized that k-flo might be right, i am a perfectionist. . and with this shindig, i have been a bit too ambitious with the menu. . . today after work i'll have to rush to leave early, pick up french bread (wanted it to be fresh), tin foil, more limes or some other fruit juice, seltzer water, a couple more pitchers, and flowers. . .ahhh. . the crazy thing is i actually enjoy the stress and chaos of throwing a party together.

by 9 or 9:30 everything will be ready, the food will be displayed beautifully, i'll have a glass of wine in hand decked out in my havana nights party dress the rest will be about having a good time, relaxing, and catching up with my friends.

sniffles

it started with an itchy throat last night. . . wasn't sure if it was from the cigarette i had tuesday night. . when it persisted this morning- i knew it was coming. as the morning wore on, a slight fever developed and my body began to ache.

i hate getting sick and the timing is terrible with the party i'm throwing friday and the weather just starting to warm up.

i took some tylenol cold and have been drinking plenty of fluids throughout the day. . . cancelled my evening plans with pua so i could go home and veg out. hopefully a solid nights sleep will ward off the cold.

tomorrow will be a busy day prepping for the party. have to hit a couple grocery stores, buy some flowers, go to the dry cleaners, and meet up with nels to go to MOMA.

i hate verizon

i have spent the better part of my day on the phone with verizon. i have been coordinating our office move from the 29th floor to the 5th floor. i ordered a new phone line, placed a move order for our phone lines and DSL on friday, and ordered a new line to be installed with DSL during the week to minimize internet downtime. sounds simple right?

on my day off, i get a call at 9:30 from my boss saying that something had gone wrong with the order. not something, everything. somehow, they thought the move order was for today! then they got the wrong address for the new phone line to be installed on the 5th floor so the guy was in a different district and wouldn't come to our office. then they cut off our DSL on the 29th floor and said there was no way of reversing it, even though we hadn't given them authorization to cut it off!

after five hours on the phone with everyone and their mother at verizon, i still haven't been able to get things completely back in order. in the beginning i was patient and calm but after being transferred for the n-th time, the little angry asian girl in me came out. not a pretty sight.

www.angrylittlegirls.com

weekend highlights

went back home to visit the family- help my brother with his wedding planning, meeting up with friends, playing with the tykes.

thursday-

got to leave work early to make my 6pm flight home. . flight was delayed for 2 hours so i didn't get back to my parents' house unil 11pm

friday-

call from stalker #1. the message goes something like this (you better believe i wasn't going to pick up that call!)

hey V it's stalker . . i know it's been awhile. just thought i'd give you a call and see how life is treating you. see if you want to hang out i guess. i know i might have seemed a little, um rash, the last time we hung out. but i do like you. and i am hoping that you give me a call to hang out and we can do something chill. if you want to hang out give me a call. my number is 555-555-5555. love to hear how you are doin gwell and everything. let me know. talk to you soon.

um, WTF. . a little "rash". i don't think so buddy. let's get together so you can freak out on me again or kidnap me!!

saturday-

had some one-on-one time with momma V. got to hear about how i need to settle down and get married because women age quickly and i won't be able to find anyone that would want to marry me. blah blah blah. and the only purpose of life is to be married and have kids. blah blah blah.

so i'm 26 and i should already be getting desperate to get married? because i really know so many couples that have happy marriages? and may i remind you, i just got out of a 6 year relationship in september?!!!

sunday-

ran into an old friend while getting brunch with the family. hadn't seen her in years and had been wondering what she had been up to. exchanged contact info and hopefully will meet up in nyc in april.

going with the flow

met up with Q2 for hot-pot at grand sichuan on canal and bowery. . .i must say, it was pretty tasty- perhaps not quite as good as what you can get in china- but the upside is it's the first time i've had hot pot and not had serious stomach aches afterwards. we ordered the two broth hot pot- one with chilies, anise, and whatever other spices that give sichuanese food its kick and one with a regular soup broth. we were a bit overzealous with our ordering and didn't even finish half of it- beef, squid balls, dried tofu, cabbage, golden tipped mushroom, wood fungus, winter melon, potato, etc.

right before dinner got a call from debs who was itching to go out. so we decided to meet up at happy ending for some drinks. . it was closed so we went to verlaine instead which had happy hour until 10PM. . great lychee martinis for $4! one drink turned to almost one too many after debs' cousin and friend came. sometime before 1 AM we went to a little japanese restaurant that served great late night snacks. hmm. .

debs crashed at my place and we were up and ready to get to work on time. . unfortunately, someone got sick on the L train ahead of ours so we were seriously delayed. . otherwise, i was ready to pat myself on the back for a late night and making it too work on time!

tying up loose ends

last night my plans to meet up with coolP and jus fell though, as i anticipated. . . instead, i met up with mikey and we tried to go to trader joes but the line was literally out the door just to get in. . .and it was just to cold to deal with the wait. instead we walked around whole foods to warm up and eventually ended up at starbucks and chatted for awhile. after that, went home and had a quick dinner and fell asleep reading interpreter of maladies. it's a great collection of short stories. . writing has to be particularly compelling to capture my interest with a short story and jhumpa lahiri succeeds.

woke up early and had a nice to-do list to tackle: taxes, wedding planning stuff, exercise, write letters, pick up laundry, buy some flowers, etc. .

unfortunately this morning i realized i am missing almost all of my LA W-2 forms! i guess i did not change my mailing address with all my different employers last year. what a pain.. .so i spent this morning digging through old emails to find the right contact info to ask them to re-send my forms.

what a pain!

kind of puts a wrench in my to-do list. . .think i should hold off on running for a bit. my knees were killing me this weekend and i really don't want to push it. if the weather isn't too bad, maybe i'll go for a walk instead. oh well. . i guess i better see to my other errands.

mixing things up

It’s been a lot of fun kicking back with the girls, eating out, and bar hopping. . . but have it’s been getting a little stale lately. One of the beautiful things about living in NYC is the plethora of cultural and artistic venues. So after a long day of work on Friday, Debs and I headed out to the International Center of Photography to check out an exhibit of African photographers. I had read about the exhibit and heard about it on NPR and was pretty excited to see it.

The backgrounds of the artists varied as much as the style and subject of the photographs. Some of the more striking, and perhaps my favorite pieces, were done by Andrew Dosunmu and Boubacar Toure Mandemory. But the shots of people’s homes and depictions of daily lives were captivating and reminded me of how ignorant I am of other country’s cultures and history.

After the museum closed, Debs and I met up with Q2 for dinner at Epistrophy- a small wine bar in the LES with simple but delicious foods and an interesting, primarily Italian wine selection. The place was very low-key and I felt like I could have been eating at a friend’s house. Quite nice. A new friend of Debs, Red, showed up at the restaurant. Cool guy, originally from Long Beach. Tired from work, Q2 made a hasty getaway after dinner ended. Of course, we ended back up at bobs and stopped at 46 grand for a bit. . but I was not really feeling it and made my own way home.

Saturday woke up on the late side and got up for a run. . .my knees have been bothering me this weekend, so I’ve only been running 4-5 miles. Must be the cold or perhaps I overdid it with my long run during the middle of the week. Met up with K-flo to look at some apartment stuff. Got a very nice knife set which I’m happy about and a bin to sort our recycling.

In the evening we went to go see a group called Billionares for Bush- a group that does satirical, musical acts and sketches.

http://billionairesforbush.com/index.php

Overall a good show, entertaining, and we both had some laughs. Afterwards, we met up with K-flo’s friend at my favorite local Mexican restaurant, Bean. Then we made our way to Black Betty. Hung out for a few and George and another friend of K-flo’s eventually joined us. Made friends with the DJ and chatted with Rico for a bit. A little before 2AM, I decided to call it a night. 

stalker #2

had been chatting with this guy i met through myspace for a few weeks. .. i know i know. . the whole concept seems kind of weird to me too, but i was trying to be open-minded and i have friends for which it has worked out. . and hey, i'm always happy to make new friends.

from the get go he was eager to meet up but with my busy schedule and reluctance to actually meet, it didn't really pan out. . then we made plans to meet up for lunch last weekend. that's when things started getting a little weird. he had told me about his little pantyhose fetish (btw, note to guys, do not start getting into your sexual fantasies unless you are sure that the girl you are talking to is open to that. it just struck me as odd and overly aggressive). then he started pleading with me to wear them at our first meeting. i was trying to play it cool and told him not to expect anything. . when he kept on pushing, i got annoyed and told him that i don't like being told what to wear. sensing that, he backed off and apologized profusely. so we were still set to meet on saturday. we exchanged numbers in case anything came up but still never talked on the phone.

out with my girls friday night and i realized that something was just off with the myspace guy and i didn't feel comfortable with the situation. so saturday i sent him a text to say i didn't think we should meet up. he tried calling but i didn't pick up. then he texted me several times. telling me i'd enjoy talking to him in person. asking if we could still meet up for lunch. asking if he could call me. i told him that i would call him when i was ready to talk. and basically have been ignoring him online since.

last night he sent me a message saying how messed up it was that i blew him off on saturday. i explained that i had thought about it and didn't think it would work out between us. when he kept on pushing, i said i thought it would be better if he didn't contact me again.

then he told me that i shouldn't have given him my number then and suggested i change it. and promptly logged off.

hmmm. . stalker material much? i'm kind of freaked out. . .i think that is the beginning and end of my attempts to meet cool people through myspace.

taking it easy

have spent the past couple nights recovering from my crazy night out tuesday. wednesday night i met up with j at sushi ann for dinner- can't believe it's been months since we've hung out. silly (or not silly depending on how you look at it) wants to go back to school again. . not satisfied with his JD he now wants to get an MBA. . .after dinner, promptly crashed and got a good 8 hours of sleep in.

after work yesterday, i had a nice seven mile run. i'm thinking about doing a long distance run this weekend. . maybe 10-12 miles. there's a nice little community of health nuts at the park i run at. one of the guys, a personal training, gave me kudos for running. that added a little spring to my steps. spent the rest of the evening relaxing, cooked dinner, and went to bed early.

now, i'm all rested up for a fun weekend ahead. tonight will have dinner at suba, a tapas place q2 suggested, mayble a little salsa, and bar hopping in the LES. saturday will meet up with jboy for lunch in astoria then go to the museum of moving images. in the evening, another crew is heading with me to supreme trading. they are recreating the space to be a saigon bar circa 1975. should be interesting to say the least.

a night of firsts

was hanging out with my buddy ec1 last night. met up at the mercer for a drink then walked over to woo lae oak for dinner. prices were higher than typical and portions were smaller- but that is probably a given since it's located in soho and going for the trendy vibe. with all that said, the miso soup was very good, reminded me of an ex's mom's home cooking, and the meat was incredibly good.

we met up with a co-worker and bob at la taverna for a bit. but ec1 and i wanted a more lively scene than just chill.

i had spoken with ec1 earlier about having always been curious about going to a strip club and being a healthy male, he was game. wound up at scores where we got a seat upfront. surprisingly, the place was not sketchy and with the stage set up it certainly felt more like a performance than women just getting naked and writhing around a pole. in fact there was no pole. the women were all beautiful, with varying body types, and differing degrees of dancing skills. . . the best dancer by far was victoria, a polish woman who had been living in LA previously. she had very striking looks and was very sensual and just had a great sense of rhythm. the second best was probably paula, a latina with an incredible figure and who was just hot.

my buddy bought me a lap dance from both. it was definately a surreal experience and i was somewhat uncomfortable at first. the whole concept is strange- the illusion is that these beautiful women are trying to seduce you but at the core, its simply an exchange of money for a service.

nevertheless, it was a fun experience. but expensive!!! never have i been to a place where they are so capable of draining your pockets!

by 2AM we were ready to dance. went to happy ending but the music was kinda lame. bob was closed. and blue sapphire was all techno. . .guess it wasn't meant to be. crawled into bed around 4:30 AM and man, i have never had such a hard time getting out of bed. . .ahhh, the sign of a great night!

weekend with the family

so my nephew who is all of a year old and some change is definately a "boob man". it's quite amazing and somewhat startling! large, small, tan or white, he is fascinated by breasts.

he likes to stare, touch, poke, etc. a grown man would get slapped for much less! lucky for him, he's still a baby and so darn cute that everyone adores him.

weekend with the family was wonderful- low key and pretty relaxing. one thing i did realize is that new york city is not exactly the most kid-friendly place. it was a struggle trying to get around with two kids and a big bulky stroller.

on friday, met up with sis, her hubby, and the kids for lunch at "say cheese" in hell's kitchen. a great place for kids and the best cheese sandwich and tomato soup i've ever had. our waiter was incredibly friendly and accomodating.

http://newyork.citysearch.com/profile/37045373/new_york_ny/say_cheese.html

then we went to the american museum of natural history. it was wonderful for tj. the kids got to run around, touch whatever they wanted, and stare in awe of the huge dinosaur fossils. then we checked into the hotel and rested a bit. we drove back to williamsburg and grabbed dinner at the williamsburg cafe. i had only been there for brunch before but i must say they have amazing sandwiches (ribeye. . hmmm. . .).

seconds after getting back into the car, the kids were passed out. we got back to the hotel, chilled, and watched t.v. and talked for a few hours. next morning, we met up with a few friends and my parents at dim sum in c-town. dim sum go go was the place. definately nice decor and the food was okay, but i still like golden unicorn the best.

my parents were exhausted because the greyhound they took was delayed and they had to wait for four hours at the richmond station for the baltimore bound bus. so we just went back to the hotel and rested up. i think we all ended up napping. for dinner, my sister and i went to hanbat to order korean takeout for the family. we had a huge feast and it was quite good (although not as good as eating there). originally, my sister, brother-in-law, and i were supposed to go out for some drinks. . but i wanted to spend more time with my parents since they got in so late.

i ended up watching lady in the tramp, beauty & the beast christmas, and mulan with my niece until she fell asleep. then my sis and brother in law went for a walk, stopped at blockbuster, and picked up some dessert. we watched "layer cake" and started to watch SNL when we heard a loud thump followed by horrendous crying- apparently my niece fell off the bed.

poor thing. . funny tho that she had no recollection of it the next day! sunday morning we headed back to williamsburg to meet nels for breakfast and so my parents could pick up the car.

the rest of the afternoon was pretty relaxing. hung out with nels for a bit, went on a 7 mile run, and watched a couple hours of the oscars at the williamsburg cafe.

momofuku

solo dinner last night at momofuku. . was craving a heart soup of pork neck ramen- perfectly hearty and salty and satisfying. . .had to wait for a few minutes to get a table in front of the kitchen. although i could have had a sit right next to al franken who was accompanied by his wife (?) and daughter (?) and her friend. . .

after dinner, came home and after surfing the net for a bit, completely crashed. at 10:30 PM. . woke up at 8AM feeling very refreshed.

nice long run at the park this morning. the first twenty minutes was pretty warm despite the beginnings of snow flakes. . all of a sudden, the snow starting coming down harder and the temperature dropped significantly.

hmm, hope it warms up by tomorrow. it always seems that when i have company in town, the weather takes a turn for the worse. . . 

unexpected late night

rolled into work around 10:30 a.m. today. . yikes! last night was a lot of fun tho. . all my girls were in excellent form!

debs & i met up with qq at inoteca in the LES. very pleased with the place- extensive wine list and while the wines by the glass are $7+, they are pretty generous portions. we ordered some cheese, cured meat, a poletna dish with root vegetables, and chicken liver salad. the food was tasty, simply prepared, and paired well with the wine.

afterwards, we checked out belly where we had another round of drinks and met up with cantongirl. being a tuesday night and early no less, it was unsurprising that the scene was dead. the four of us headed to china one and chilled for awhile. got a private tour of the bar downstairs, kitchen area, etc. and hung out with burns for awhile. cool guy. debs totally worked blondie from texas and his friends.

bob appeared as out of nowhere and took us to his bar. cantongirl was holding court with two boys that we had met from china one. sometime after midnight, she was ready to jet so i left with her. met up with nels and a friend at teddy's. couldn't drink anymore but hung out anyways. . stayed up way too late. . . had to rush to get to work at some semblance of a reasonable hour. . left my contacts at home and can't remember if i turned the water off. . .