judyonthenet

This past weekend, Kelvin and I flew to Virginia near DC to attend Jamie, one of my best friends from college, and Gricel’s wedding. Aside from the 5-hour airplane rides (I hate flying), it was overall a pretty decent trip.

Friday
I ended up booking round trip tickets for less than $300 a person, which is awesome. What’s not so awesome is that both the departing and return trips leave at 7AM in the morning. We woke up super-early, drove to the SFO long-term parking, and got to our gate right when boarding started. Thank goodness Virgin America has assigned seating; I was way too tired to think about it.

This was my first trip with Virgin America, and I loved TVs provided at every seat. You can buy services, food, and watch television through the little screen. Even though I was tired, I have a hard time sleeping on planes. However, instead of sleeping, I got to watch the US vs. Slovenia World Cup soccer game. I missed the first half, which turned out to be a good thing, since US was down 0-2 when the second half started. I got to watch US make their comeback and get robbed their winning goal with many other passengers on the plane. Everyone on the plane was made well-aware of when US scored goals, regardless of whether or not they were actually watching the game. Probably sucked for people trying to sleep… but GO USA!

These screens love to freeze. For most of the trip I kept
thinking we were stuck over Kansas. *shudder*

At IAD (which is a pretty nice airport, btw), we picked up our rental at Alamo. Rather than sticking to whatever cheap and practical sedan I had booked, Kelvin upgraded to a Camaro. I figured, okay, whatever, he’s driving anyway. But then they gave us this bright yellow thing. Great, we’re fricking driving Bumblebee!

Before checking in to our hotel, we drove a block past our hotel to grab a late lunch at KFC. I haven’t had KFC in a while, so I was happy to be indulging in cheap fried chicken. Because I’m a procrastinator, we went to the CVS next door after lunch to buy some water, face soap, and things to wrap Jamie’s wedding present so that it actually looks like a gift.

We checked into the Courtyard Dulles Airport Marriott, which is only three exits away from the airport. Jamie’s church is about 30 minutes away, but a hotel close to the airport would make it easier to hit our 7:50AM flight on Sunday. The room is small, but has all the amenities one would need, including a mini-fridge. The bed and pillows were very comfortable. So comfortable, I made the mistake of lying down and passing out for three hours. The only annoyance is the ancient A/C that was really noisy and lacking precise temperature control.

The last time I had been on the East Coast was when I finished my college education. That was… about five years ago? I basically wanted to eat all the chain restaurants I missed from being in California. Tonight we had Legal Sea Foods at the mall in Tysons Corner. I had a bowl of chowder and two crabcakes, while Kelvin had surf & turf. The food was as good as I remembered (always went to the one in Kendall Square), but it was more quantity and richer than I remembered. Way too much food. Our waiter was super nice, and he even gave me a free bowl of chowder to-go, even though I had just told him I was going to explode. At least our room has a mini-fridge so I can put it somewhere until I figure out what to do with it.

After dinner, we went straight back to the hotel, where we prepared our attire (and Jamie’s gift) for the next day. I also watched many episodes of the Dog Whisperer. I watch SO much TV when I stay at a hotel…

Saturday
We headed out to Jamie’s wedding right after getting up. Halfway to the church, I realized I left his wedding gift in the hotel room. Even after I had gone back to the room to grab my phone that I had forgotten… which was sitting next to the gift. I can’t believe I did this AGAIN. Heading back to get the gift at that point would mean we’d be late for the ceremony, so we decided to continue on our way.

At the church, I ran into Jamie and his best man, Bob (another college classmate), at the entrance to the church. Last time I saw Jamie was my wedding, and the last time I saw Bob was in college, but they both are about the same as always, which is nice. After a quick chat, we sat down in the church.

It’s a pretty big church, but the wedding itself was much more modest. For a religious wedding, it was surprisingly quick. Gricel looked beautiful. I think Jamie trapped himself a good one.

One minor complaint about the wedding: what an obnoxious photographer! She would always stand in the middle of everything. Most photographers I’ve seen, if they need to be in the way, they get out of the way ASAP. She was just standing there half the time, not even always taking pictures! Right in the middle of the aisle! Can’t she squat once in a while or something? And her camera had to be the noisiest camera I’ve ever heard. The beeping of camera and the constant buzzing of her flash… why is she even using her flash? She has a fancy camera and the couple is well lit. ARGH! (In contrast, the videographer was quite the ninja. I didn’t even notice him until Kelvin pointed him out in the shadows at the front of the church sitting on a ledge like a gargoyle.)

Also, Kelvin’s cellphone alarm went off during the ceremony. Thankfully, it was peaceful harp sounds instead of NOM NOM NOM or the Hawaii Five-O theme.

After the ceremony, we checked out where the reception was and decided to high-tail back to the hotel to get the wedding gift. Even though it took less than 30 minutes to get to the church, it took over 45 minutes each way just to get the present. Getting to the hotel, I thought it was my fault because I messed up the directions back. However, the return trip, which was the same route we took in the morning, was equally awful. I don’t know where the heck all these people came from or where they’re going on an early Saturday afternoon! And it’s hot and muggy. Don’t these people want to stay home with their A/C?

And we ran into the most random delays, the strangest being at the intersection right in front of the church. A Prius wouldn’t go on a green, so we (along with many other cars) honked and passed it, only to find an old man sitting at the wheel passed out. WEIRD.

By the time we made it back, we missed most of the reception (which appeared to be BBQ buffet) and made it just in time for the cake cutting and bouquet toss.

Nice cake toppers :D

I finally had a chance to talk to Jamie and Gricel, who were prominently featured at their sweetheart table.

Bride and groom on display

Jamie prepared to fight crime even during his own wedding.

A pic with my classmates (Rodney, where are you?!)

My favorite part of their wedding had to be the send-off. I’ve never been to a wedding with a send-off. We were given little bubbles to blow, and their groomsmen had decorated Jamie’s getaway (or escape, har har) car. They even had cans attached to their SUV! I’ve only seen that on TV!

After the wedding, we went to the next East Coast chain on my list for mini-lunch: Friendly’s! We shared a cheeseburger and potato wedges because we were going to have dinner in four hours. I don’t know what it is about Friendly’s, but I always like their food. I only went there a few times when I was in Boston because it was quite a walk to get there, but it was always worth it. In fact, I’m pretty sure I always went with Jamie. We finished lunch with a scoop of mint chip ice cream.

Instead of going back to the hotel, we went to the National Air and Space Museum in Chantilly. It’s one exit away from our hotel because it’s on airport property, and it’s free after 4PM. It also closes at 5:30PM, which is good for Kelvin because he doesn’t particularly like spending a lot of time in museums.

The museum is basically a hangar crammed with all sorts of flying machines. You don’t have to be an aviation nerd to find the museum interesting. It was neat seeing all the different planes from different eras. Highlights were Enola Gay, the space shuttle, and the Blackbird (wth, ANOTHER Transformer?). Definitely a good way to kill an hour.

At Jamie’s wedding, we arranged to meet up with Bob for dinner. This time, we went to a restaurant to a chain restaurant Bob was missing: Uno Chicago Grill (AKA Pizzeria Uno). I caught up with Bob, who I haven’t seen in 5-6 years and is currently doing grad school in Taiwan. We’ll probably see him again whenever we go visit my grandparents sometime this year.

After dinner, we lounged in our hotel room for the rest of the night, watching Silent Library and finishing up my clam chowder.

Sunday
Another early morning flight, so we had to wake up early again, which was extra painful with the time difference. We returned Bumblebee, flew home, and I passed out on the couch from being unable to sleep on the plane.

Bye bye Bumblebee

New thing I learned today: The Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird has movable cones to vary the air intake to the engines.

I also learned from going to the museum that Kelvin already knows a lot of random things about certain airplanes, like that tidbit above.

Last month, I went to Los Angeles for Sandra‘s bridal shower. This month, she actually got married! She had family-only wedding in Vegas and had a casual reception for friends the next weekend in Culver City. Kelvin and I spent the weekend there to attend her friendception, hang out with some folks on our TF2 server, and meet up with Jack, Kelvin’s friend since forever and best man at our wedding.

Speaking of my wedding, Sandra was maid-of-honor at my wedding, and she also caught the bouquet. She’s the first of my friends to get married after me, so she has officially fulfilled ancient wedding lore and tradition.

Friday
We drove to SFO and used the airport’s long term parking. Our flight was slightly delayed, but the plane trip was quick, and we were in LAX before 10PM. We went to Alamo to pick up our Kia… Rio I think? It was a dinky red car I forgot to take a picture of. Kelvin “navigated” as I drove us to our hotel, the Four Points Sheraton in Culver City, where we dropped off our luggage.

They didn’t have any rooms left with one king bed, so we were stuck with two queens. Room was clean, and the way they label all the amenities was cute. Yay for free bottled water! Bathroom was TINY tho.

For dinner, the closest place we could find that was open late was Manna, a Korean BBQ place at the Westfield Mall (AKA Fox Hills Mall) across the street from our hotel. The kitchen was closing soon, so we had to rush our dinner a bit. I wasn’t that hungry, so we just split one order of beef. Despite this and the late hour, we still got good service.

The restaurant is very non-Asian people friendly: nice decor, friendly servers, and instructions on the menu on how to eat everything. The types of appetizers and mild flavors also catered towards non-Asians, and they had some stuff I’ve never had at a Korean place before (cooked eggs, salad with a strong horseradish dressing, wraps for the meat). The kimchee wasn’t that great, but everything else was pretty good. Kelvin liked the milder food and the fancy grills with vents built into the sides.

After dinner, we went back to the hotel and straight to bed.

Saturday
Because Kelvin was starting a new job on Monday, he wanted to start getting up early this weekend. Why he didn’t start this during the three weeks he had off, I have no idea. We watched some House MD until it was brunch-ish time. For brunch, I Yelped up local restaurants and found Green Peas down Sepulveda Blvd.

Pretty inexpensive, probably because portions aren’t very big. I don’t like large portions anyway, so this was a good thing. I had bacon scrambled eggs, which was simple and yummy. Fruit salad was fresh, though the toast was dry and needed butter (which I was too lazy to ask for). Kelvin got an omelette and wasn’t impressed; he said everything was bland. I think he’s just thrown off by the fact that their menu has a lot of healthy, vegan dishes.

After lunch, we just hung out in the hotel room, watching poker tournaments on TV. We contemplated driving 40 minutes to an Asian arcade to check out BlazBlue Continuum Shift, but in the end, we were too lazy. Around 5ish, we went out to the nearest Baskin Robbins for a milkshake. I noticed the area was familiar, which meant we were near Sandra’s place. I called her to see if she was already at the friendception site setting up, and she was. She told us we can come early and hang if we’re bored, so we did.

Sandra and Owen held their reception at Bluebird Cafe, a Mexican restaurant/caterer plus cupcake bakery. I already visited this place with Sandra last time I was in LA. It has a nice, open area with picnic tables, very rustic and not cafeteria-like. There’s an open indoors space, a small stage for a band, a bar area, and outdoors firepit-thingy. Very appropriate setting for Sandra and Owen’s shindig.

The only unfortunate thing was the weather, which was abnormally cold for LA this time of year. Same thing happened last time I came to visit, but this time was a little extra strange because the night before and after was typical LA warm. I, along with all the other out-of-towners, checked the weather report beforehand, but even the weatherman couldn’t forecast this weirdly cold weather. Thankfully, Bluebird has a few heatlamps, so I spent most of the evening huddled near one.

The Mexican buffet was yummy, though I didn’t eat as much as I should have. We played games for most of the night, and I can’t stand eating finger foods and playing board games at the same time. I mainly ate appetizers before gaming and didn’t eat anything during the games. I saw some delicious-looking tacos, but managed not to eat any of them. I made sure not to miss out on cupcakes though, which were good just like the last time I had them.

Deborah dealing next to Justin

I’m not particularly social, so most of the night I played games with people I already knew: Sandra’s brother and his gf plus old classmates from high school (a couple I haven’t seen in 10 years… wow, I’m old now). We played Texas Hold ‘Em and Settlers of Catan, both of which I won somehow. Settlers of Catan was pretty fun, but Kelvin still manages to bitch about the game even though we (as a team, but he did everything pretty much) won the game.

(Longest) road to victory = army of sheep

I was a little anxious seeing old high school people, but everything turned out to be great! I’m really happy for Sandra. Owen is super awesome; I approve! Congratulations again to Sandra and Owen!

Sunday
I had a difficult time sleeping. Because we had two queen beds, we slept in a different bed each night for kicks. You’d think the beds would be the same, but I was much more comfortable the first night than the second night. Not sure what was up with that. I thought Kelvin would wake us up early, but I guess he also slept terribly as we both slept in a bit.

We met up with folks from our TF2 server for lunch. Bean, being the super-nice guy he is, with Draconis picked us up at our hotel in Culver City all the way from Arcadia to eat lunch back in Arcadia. Now, if you know nothing about LA geography like I did, let me tell you that it’s about 30-40min without traffic. And there’s always traffic in LA. I was glad I didn’t have to deal with driving that because LA roads and drivers scare the piss out of me. I told Sandra the day before about our plans for Sunday, and the conversation went something like this:

Judy: Yeah, so our friends from the server are taking us to Din Tai Fung for lunch.
Sandra: Din Tai Fung, omigawd, I told you about that place before. I love Din Tai Fu- wait a sec, that’s really far.
Judy: It’s okay, our friend’s picking us up. He lives in Arcadia, too.
Sandra: Dude, that’s crazy. This guy is crazy.
Judy: He’s used to it, he commutes from Arcadia to Irvine.
Sandra: Dude, you’re going to end up in a tub of ice in Tijuana without your kidneys. Take my pepper spray.

So, I had to text Sandra throughout the day to assure her I still had all my organs. Anyway, Bean and Draconis aren’t black market organ-dealers, kidnappers, or serial killers. I already met Draconis from GDC, and Avery has met Bean before and told me he’s cool, so I wasn’t particularly worried then either. Not that Bean isn’t weird, because he is. Along with the games he said he’d help me get, he got me this kid’s book he saw while shopping for goodies for a friend’s baby:

Spoiler alert for the book: it’s about a freaky little finger puppet duck who wants to be your friend and play with you. Yeah, THANKS BEAN. Anyways…

Bean drove us to Arcadia via 134, I think? Draconis seemed scared for his life, as Bean drives like a, um, typical BMW driver. (btw, a beaner driving a Beamer? lolol) I noticed the drive is a bit more scenic up here than down by West LA. However, even the huge mountains can’t escape the haze.

I’ve never been to the northeast part of the LA area, but I’ve been told it’s Asian People Central, and it pretty much lives up to that. It was very reminiscent of Cupertino; there’s even a Shinbala! (I just read those Yelp reviews… they apparently don’t have stinky tofu like the one in Cupertino! WTF is up with that??) It’s like I’m at home! Din Tai Fung was busy, but they got to our number quickly. We were still waiting for eMo (who introduced everyone to this place), Butters, and his gf (AKA CompanionCube) to arrive though, so we chatted outside until everyone arrived.

They seated us at a large table upstairs. We ordered a bunch of dishes, including their specialty xiao-long-baos. Their XLBs? REALLY GOOD. Lived up to all the hype Sandra gave it. Light, just right amount of saltiness and flavor, juicy. The broth wasn’t completely scalding, though Draconis still managed to burn his mouth shoving one immediately into his face newb-style. Their other dishes (fried noodles, won tons, dumplings) were also very good, though they have the weirdest take on shao mai I’ve ever seen.

I forgot to take pics of the food, so for yummy pics, check out Sandra’s food blog.

Service was a bit on the slow side, as food would trickle in one dish at a time. Everyone would still be starving after we annihilated one dish, so we kept ordering more. In the end, we ordered too much. Even then, I thought the price was pretty reasonable. You know what’s really strange? The servers are actually friendly and not grumpy. They smile at you and say thanks when you leave. I think the joint loses some authenticity points right there.

After lunch, we grabbed dessert at a nearby Yogurtland. I also ate Yogurtland last time I was in LA. Whenever I get dessert in Cupertino, it’s Yogurtland. I think I need to broaden my frozen yogurt horizons… but Yogurtland is sooo good and cheap.

Bean really packed his cup in. I made him let me pay for it in thanks for
the games. Only what… 20 more cups of yogurt before we’re even?

After dessert, Jack met up with us in Arcadia. Everybody went to Dave & Busters to kill time before our flight. I’ve never been to Dave & Busters before in the Bay Area, but I imagine this one was very similar. We played several arcade games that netted me 800 tickets, which I spent on cheap-o shot glasses for me, Bean, and Draconis.

Some multiplayer trivia game about people I’ve never heard of…
random guessing makes me a winner!

It was convenient that Jack met up with us, since he could take us back to our hotel and Bean won’t have made four Arcadia-Culver City trips. Though, I almost had to call Bean to take us back when the door handle to Jack’s ride (a hand-me-down minivan, haha) got stuck on open and the door wouldn’t shut. Kelvin and Jack probably spent a good five minutes (felt longer than that) jiggling the handle and all the latches in the door before the door finally managed to lock shut with the handle still depressed open. And during our ride back, the handle magically and randomly returned to its shut state, and everything was back to normal. That was exciting.

Jack the soccer mom

Traffic on the 10 was crappy, but we made it back with enough time to drop off Sandra’s wedding gift (I left it in the hotel room the night before) at her apartment before getting to LAX for our flight. And that was our trip to LA! Much thanks to everyone who took the time to hang out with us and take us around!

New thing I learned today: Sepulveda Boulevard is the longest street in Los Angeles.

Last week when I found out Kelvin had three weeks to goof around, I suggested we take road trip, maybe to Monterey. Kelvin mentioned he had wanted to take me to a glass beach up the north coast of California. He even had a particular bed & breakfast in mind to stay at. He never plans any trips for us (which I have complained about), and I’d never even heard of a glass beach, so I asked him when he thought of that. He said he had considered taking me for my birthday, but at the time I seemed uninterested in any kind of gift, so he threw the idea out the window. (One of many times he’s told me he thought about doing something awesome, but ended up not doing it, hence forfeiting any credit he ought to receive for being a thoughtful and creative significant other. *facepalm*)

I told him I loved the idea (and I don’t get why he didn’t go through with it in January), and that we’ll just do it next week. It’d be the middle of the week, so probably not too busy in terms of vacationers. No bookings, no schedule, no plans, except to make it to this glass beach at some point. And we did go! Left on Tuesday and came back today. Here’s what we did!

(Warning: LONG post ahead.)
(more…)

Sorry for the lack of posts last week, wasn’t in the mood for blogging. I’ve also tried to avoid blogging during “work hours”, but I give up today :P

I went down to Los Angeles to attend Sandra’s bridal shower, and Sandra and Owen let me stay with them the entire weekend, along with giving me rides and taking me to a bunch of yummy places to eat. Outside of flying (don’t get me started), the weekend trip was fun and not too crazy. Much thanks to Sandra and Owen for such hospitality!

btw, Sandra asked what I wanted to do while I was in LA; I said I just wanted to try good food. She delivered, so if it seems like all we did was eat, then… well… yeah, that’s pretty much it.

Friday
Flew into LAX around 10PM, where the first thing I heard in the background when I exited the gate was “I hopped off the plane at LAX with a dream and a cardigan…“. (Thank you LAX for getting crappy teeny bopper music stuck in my head for the rest of the weekend.) Sandra picked me up, and we headed straight to Hakata Ramen for a late dinner.

Sandra and appetizers

I’m told that you know a place is good if you have to wait a long time to sit down, and this was certainly the case for Hakata Ramen. We had to wait a good 45 minutes or so to get seated, but we were entertained by conversation and a TV with advertisements for more Japanese food (must… get… yakitori…). The ramen was indeed delicious. Their pork broth is flavorful, yet not too heavy, which is rare. The noodles are flour noodles instead of egg noodles. Very reminiscent of Maru Ichi, but with much thinner noodles.

They like their ginger, apparently.

After dinner, we went back to Sandra’s, where I chatted with Owen (who had awoken from his bear nap) and Sandra until 3AMish. I think I should talk to them more online, because we apparently had a lot to catch up on!

Saturday
Bridal shower day! I woke up in the morning to Sandra’s super nice friend and maid-of-honor, Patty, coming into the apartment with Sandra’s altered wedding dress. I hung out with Owen while Sandra and Patty did their bridal tailoring stuff in a different room. When they were done, we headed off to the bridal shower, which was completely organized by Patty.

Sandra took Patty and me down to Santa Monica, which is where Anisette Brasserie is located. While Patty set up (I tried to help but she’s rather… insistent), I chilled with Sandra at the bar waiting for guests to arrive. Once everyone was there, it was bridal shower time! Anisette Brasserie has generally nice ambiance, but the manager had seated us in a small area upstairs, which was even nicer. It was isolated, looked over the entire restaurant, and had a great view of the kitchen. We dined and played shower games.

What makes French hamburger French?

The freebie bread was really good (and indulgent), very buttery and flakey with touches of cheese. For lunch, I had the Croque Madame. It’s kind of like a French grilled ham & cheese sandwich with an egg on top, except the middle isn’t really grilled much and the bread is incredibly bad for you. I wasn’t a fan of the weird French cheese, but other than that, not bad.

Patty + three members of Owen’s zany family

Sandra gave all attendees these very fancy all natural soaps from Soaptopia. Kelvin’s been wanting to try all-natural soaps, so this was conveniently nice. I’m not a big fan of handmade soaps because they tend to have pleasant smelling natural scents. That may sound weird, but it bothers me a little when soap smells good enough to eat. Like maybe I’ll find myself eating soap or something. And these do smell heavenly.

I got to have the extra one!

After the bridal shower, I was feeling zombie-ish because of all the heavy eating we’ve been doing. We dropped by Owen’s aunt’s place to pick up baby pictures for their wedding slideshow, and then the rest of the afternoon was vegging in front of the television, recovering from the heavy eating. Eventually, we managed to get our butts off the sofa to grab dinner. San Mateo is seriously lacking in Korean food, and I wanted something easy on the stomach, so we went to get tofu at BCD Tofu House.

Sandra and Owen munching on fish

With the grumpy tummy and the chilly weather, it really hit the spot. I was pleasantly surprised by the fried fish they give each person as a snackie. For dessert, we got more fermented goodness at Yogurtland. Back at Sandra’s place, Owen seemed offended that I had never watched Zoolander, so he made me watch it. It was, um, entertaining… Orange Mocha Frappuccino!

Sunday
Everybody got up late, so the original plan of dim sum for brunch was out of the picture. Instead, we went to Don Antonio’s for Mexican food. It was sooooo good (and heavy), and I really like the freebie chips and salsa. It wasn’t even a hole-in-the-wall place, so it was a nice place to sit down and chat.

Mmmm…

After lunch, we went to Little Osaka to shop at toy stores and get some boba. We also dropped by Sandra and Owen’s friendception venue, since Owen hadn’t seen the place in person before. The venue also sells cupcakes, so I grabbed a couple red velvets for the road.

Having consumed heavy Mexican food and a large cup of milk tea, I did more resting on the couch back at their place. (I’m always amazed at how much nothing I enjoy doing.) Owen played Fallout 3 and Sandra napped until it was dinnertime. I wanted something light again, so they took me to get some Tender Greens. Very fresh and crisp salads.

Owen’s half-blinking in this one. Sorry Owen!

Sandra dropped me off at the airport right after dinner, and five hours later (after stupid delays and self-inflicted airport drama, such as forgetting cell phone at Sandra’s place), I was finished with my SoCal diversion and back in the Bay.

Thanks again to Sandra and Owen for taking me places! See you next month!

New thing I learned today: Gruyère is a hard cheese made of cow’s milk, and it is the cheese commonly used in croque monsieurs/madames.

I booked tickets to Vegas a couple months ago, simply because tickets were cheap. It’s also right after both Kelvin’s and my birthdays, so I used that as an excuse to go. I barely took any pictures during our trip. Having been to Vegas several times, I’m no longer impressed by the artificiality of the place, so I rarely take pictures of anything. Plus, I can’t take pictures of most of the entertainment there, like gambling areas and shows. As a result, my Vegas pictures this time around mainly consist of food.

Friday
Our flight was delayed half an hour, but we still managed to fly into Vegas before 11PM. Check-in at Treasure Island was a breeze as there was no line. Room was decent, but it was located in the back where you could almost kinda get a peek of the Strip but only mostly see the Treasure Island tower and the roof of the casino. Bed and pillows were super comfy, and the room wasn’t static-y, but that was probably because of the cooler weather.

We dropped our stuff off and ate at our favorite place to eat in Vegas: Noodle Asia.

On the way back, we bought a couple bottles of water at the Walgreens. Back at the hotel room, we showered and went to bed, as the next day was busy…

Saturday
Got up at 8AM, which was REALLY hard. We were meeting up with Anna at Paris to have breakfast at 8:45, and after that, we were going to taping of Let’s Make a Deal. The show likes people to dress up, so the best we could do last minute was have Kelvin wear his dog-eating hat and I would wear a track suit and hold the dog’s leash. I don’t have a track suit, so I wore whatever obnoxiously colored running wear I could find at Target. And all Target had was this ugly-ass pink track set. While I don’t mind wearing offensively colored things (people wear things like this regularly all the time), I took great offense to the pants. CAPRI SWEATPANTS. Disgusting. Who invented these things?! I got it anyway since it was the only jacket/pants set in pink I could find that was my size. This morning, I grumpily put them on. Thankfully, I believe no footage exists where I am seen wearing these damn things.

We took a cab to Paris, where we met up with Anna and had breakfast at La Creperie. Kelvin had some omelette crepe, I had a Nutella crepe, and Anna had some berry crepe. None of us took pictures cuz we were zombies busy drinking coffee. Kelvin ate all of his, but Anna and I only ate 1/3rd of our own crepes. So much sugar… After crepes, we grabbed a cab to the Tropicana, where the Vegas Let’s Make a Deal shows are taped.

The whole Let’s Make a Deal experience is worthy of its own post, so I’ll skip it for now and hopefully eventually put a link… here? Summary: Kelvin and I didn’t get to be contestants, so boo.

I was originally going to put on makeup and do my pigtails neatly (like in front of
a mirror and with a brush), but getting up early made me brain-dead and extra-
lacking in motor skills, so I just ended up looking scary. At least Anna is cute!

After LMAD, we had a late lunch with Anna’s cousin and her boyfriend at Wolfgang Puck Bar & Grill at MGM Grand. They have generous portions, so Kelvin and I split a chicken noodle soup and gnocchi. Tasted decent, though th gnocchi was a bit salty for my tastes.

When we finished lunch, we headed back to our hotel, while Anna went with her cousin to Bellagio for dessert. I wanted to go too, but I was SO TIRED. I could feel myself getting grumpier with each passing second, so I didn’t want to pass my grumpy cloud to company while they’re eating sweets. Back at TI, I napped for a good two hours.

It was dinnertime after nap, and Kelvin was wanting cheap prime rib. Before heading out in search of cheap prime rib, we walked across the street to the Fashion Show (mall) to look for a coat. I had warned Kelvin that Vegas had highs in the 50s, but he still didn’t bring anything warmer than a track jacket. Macy’s had some really great deals of jackets and sweaters; we got an Alfani coat and a Calvin Klein sweater. We were already past the the $100 minimum (pre-discount) to get an additional 25% off, so I got a cute top as well (which ended up being the most expensive item in the bag). Kelvin looks good in his new winter wear, though he’d look even better if his pants were slimmer.

We walked down the east side of the strip, looking for dinner. We made it all the way down to Kelvin’s favorite gambling spot, Bill’s Gamblin’ Hall and Saloon, and they also happened to have many posters advertising $15 prime rib dinner at the Victorian Room. Guess where we ate for dinner? :P I was in the mood for cheap steak, but their steak wasn’t that cheap. During late-night hours, they have a $6 steak and eggs deal, but this was normal regular dinnertime, so I just got their overpriced cheapo steak. Decent meal, considering price and cheesy dining atmosphere (prime rib and Chinese food in the same place!).

Bill’s is one of the few places on the strip that regularly has $5 minimum craps tables. All the tables were full, except for the one next to entrance where the air was freezing. Kelvin likes it here because of the low minimums, nice dealers, and he claims he always wins here. We tolerated the empty spot of the table with the cold breeze, won some monies, and walked back to TI.

We called it an early night. I think there was something in the air, because most of the trip I was tired to some level. Either that or we’re old people. I fell asleep watching movies on TBS. Yep, old people.

Sunday
We still got up pretty late despite going to bed a little earlier. I wanted to see a show, so we went to the box office to get tickets to Mystere. They had a buy-1-get-1 free dealio, so we got center seats for ~$60 a person for the 7PM show. That was better than anything I could find online earlier, both in price and seating, so I was stoked.

Ever since we got to TI, I have been constantly smelling pho when leaving the hotel room because the cafe next to the elevators on the casino floor sells pho. And is called Pho. So we had pho for lunch. It was good pho, too. I don’t know if it was $14 good, but there was a lot of broth and fixin’s (practically a whole lime per person!) and flavor was comparable to all the good pho I could find at home.

TI had $5 craps going, so Kelvin played a few points. Table wasn’t hot, so overall, we were down when we left. Not much to do, so we walked down the west side of the strip. Unsurprisingly, we found ourselves back at Bill’s. They had some hot shooters, so we were able to kill a bit of time there as well and left up almost a couple hundred. I played some slots, lost monies, and we headed back to TI.

There was still some time before the show, and we spent it at the Pai Gow tables. Someone taught me how to play Pai Gow a long time ago, but I had since forgotten. The game is simple enough, and the odds are close to half, so it’d seem we could play for a while. In the end, we still managed to lose 50 bucks in 20 minutes. It was mostly just us, but a guy came and did all the other things you apparently can do in Pai Gow Poker (buy the dragon hand, play as bank). I didn’t realize there was more to the game than just your hand and the dealer’s hand; I need to read up on this later.

We went to the Mystere theater at 6:30 and waited in our seats until the show started. It was… okay. I didn’t like the theatrics of Ka, but I was a bit underwhelmed with Mystere as well. Clowns and acrobatics were good, but wasn’t impressed with the dancing (which, looking at the Mystere website, replaced a missing “Hand-to-Hand” act) and Taiko drumming (which I see at any Japanese event here). The giant snail thing was kind of freaky, too. The show was still entertaining and worth the money, though.

Kelvin was still craving Asian stuff, and Venetian had more Asian options, so we went back there again. A couple of the places seemed too trendy when Kelvin was wanting simple food, and I didn’t want to eat at Noodle Asia again. Instead, we went to Zine in Palazzo, another Asian noodle place. Nice, modern decor, crappy, overpriced food. Kelvin claimed the Szechuan beef noodles (which was cheaper than Noodle Asia at $12), so I got pho AGAIN. An $18 bowl of pho even! Some BS about filet mignon meat, which was way worse than the cheap stuff they typically use in normal pho places. Kelvin’s beef noodles didn’t seem that great either, making Noodle Asia the clearly superior beef noodle soup option. For pho, go to Pho.

I played a lot of slots after dinner. They’re getting really creative with the slots; they have these “community” slots where 3 or 4 slot machines are hooked up to a central computer. When one person gets a special lighty-uppy bonus event, everyone on that server has to stop playing their game and watch the event. The winnings of the event go to everyone playing on the server, making the slots a lot more social and interactive. I enjoyed playing the slots, bitching and cheering with other people at the same statistically crappy system. Kelvin thinks slots is the dumbest thing, which I understand. What I don’t understand is his incessant bitching of me playing it. I’m not sure why I enjoy the lights and spinnies of slot machines (probably from the same part of my brain that likes reality TV), but can’t a girl throw away her money in peace?

I lost about $20 to this round of penny slots and wasted an hour of time. We went back to our hotel room, but we were still bored and weren’t sleepy for once, so we went back to the casino floor. We attempted Pai Gow Poker again. A couple times, I also bought the dragon hand. With the house getting ridiculous hands like straights and triple pairs, this just means I lost my money twice as fast. Losing my $20 (or was it $40?) at Pai Gow Poker, we were still bored and decided to go for craps. Unfortunately, the tables were up to $10. High for our bankroll, but we played anyway. And consequently lost $400. Sigh.

Tired of losing money and only having enough cash for the cab fare back to the airport anyway, we called it a night.

Monday
Slept in late again, but our check-out time was 1PM, so no issues. We crammed all our possessions in Kelvin’s rolling suitcase and went downstairs to the lobby for check-out. Starting last October, TI implemented a ridiculous $22 daily resort fee. I knew about this already, so I took this into account when booking the room (even though I’m finding this trend of resort fees as obnoxious as anyone else would). Unfortunately, a lot of people didn’t read up on reviews as much as I did. Everyone in front of us in line (about 3 parties) stormed away from the check-out desk, outraged and pissed off because they just found they have to pay an extra $22 a day for benefits they most likely never used. (Benefits don’t even include free water!) I don’t blame them for being angry, but it probably makes me look like a saint to the check-out people. They must hate their jobs.

Not wanting to think about food and spend a lot money, we had lunch at Noodle Asia. After lunch, we took a cab to the airport. The flight back home… TOTALLY SUCKY. SO turbulent towards the end. I knew there was a storm coming into San Jose, but that was much bumpier than I expected. I was scared to death, but of course, all Kelvin the Fearless could think about was:

They’re taking the hobbits to Isengard!

Apparently Kelvin can’t talk-bubble links. LAME.

New thing I learned today: The house gets the edge in Pai Gow Poker through two things: 1) They charge a 5% commission on winning (you bet $10, you’d win $9.50 while house gets 50 cents), 2) House wins ties. House edge is about 2.85%. This edge is decreased if you play as bank, an option in Pai Gow Poker. Because of its slow pace,

After reading up more on the game, I’m intrigued. Next time, we’re in gambling land, I think I’m going to play more Pai Gow Poker. I like that it’s slow-paced and social, sounds like a good game for getting free drinks. Too bad TI Pai Gow Poker was rigged and their waitresses are slow and/or non-existent. *grumble grumble*