Foster City

My friend from college who lives out in Silicon Valley recently moved from San Mateo to Foster City. I really liked his neighborhood in San Mateo. The weather and upscale setting provided a nice quality of life. The town was nice too. There's a main street with a Jamba Juice, good restaurants, and even an Equinox. San Mateo even has it's own "Central Park", which I find a bit dubious. New York has the rights to the name "Central Park" and no other city. My friend lived in a rental apartment right across the street from a very spacious Whole Foods and other retail and dining places. And on that topic I have to say that Whole Foods in California are a lot nicer than ones here in NY, not that the Whole Foods in NY are shitty. No, far from it. But the ones in California are even nicer if that's possible.

Then one day, my friend was told by his building management company that he'd have to move because they were converting all the units into condos. The management company helped my friend find a new apartment in one of the other buildings they managed, and eventually my friend found one. He took over a lease for an apartment in Foster City.

Before my friend moved there, I had never heard of Foster City, but I had some initial impressions of what it would be like. For some reason, whenever I hear a town's name with the word "city", I always think of Detroit because of it's nickname as the "Motor City" and then equate that town with what I imagine Detroit would be like. Then of course, there's Dodge City, Rapid City, etc, and none of those places sound all that appealing either. Now, two things. First, I have never been to Detroit, but everything I've heard about it hasn't been good. All I've heard is poor, ghetto, crime-ridden neighborhoods and a population rife with unemployment since General Motors is a shit-hole company, with Ford and Chrysler only marginally better. Then of course I think about Motown too, but their glory days have long been over ever since Boyz II Men started doing the tours of Indian reservation casinos.

The second thing is I realize that I live in "New York CITY". But no one ever says, "I'm from New York City" unless you're a total douchebag trying to impress someone. And New York is New York. No one would ever confuse Detroit for New York.

So as my friend began to tell me more about his new apartment and his new neighborhood, I wasn't getting a good vibe. He told me that he was moving to "Foster City" (I hear "ghetto city") and instead of Whole Foods, he now lives near an "Asian Market" (I hear "ghetto NY style Korean deli.") Combined with the fact that my friend didn't have much time to find an apartment and move and probably had to find a place at the last minute, I was convinced that he lived in some hell-hole.

You can imagine my surprise when I finally visited his new place to see a nice-looking town that was apparently built as a planned community with lots of parks. When we drove up to his new apartment complex, I was really surprised to see a nice strip mall with a UPS store, the mother of all Chipotle franchises (seriously, this was the most spectacular and biggest Chipotle I have ever seen) and some other retail. And that Asian grocery store? It was actually a Ranch 99 and looked like a totally normal (and big) supermarket. I kind of wish we had a Ranch 99 in NY, so it'd be easier for me to get Korean food ingredients.

Being "City-ist" can be really dangerous.

Yoanna House Is Following Me

I live on the Upper West Side near Lincoln Center. It's a pretty nice neighborhood and has everything I could ever need. I live within walking distance of Central Park, two Equinox branches, four gourmet grocery stores (Balduccis, Citarella, Fairway and Whole Foods), across the street from a Citibank, and access to both the 1/9 & 2/3 subway lines. Most of my friends live downtown and I used to as well in Gramercy. When I moved to the Upper West Side, people thought I lived in outer space because they said it was "soooooo far." But I enjoy living uptown, especially when I was working at my old job down on Wall Street. Coming home to the Upper West Side (even if sometimes it was at 4AM) gave me a nice sense of detachment from the office.

Obviously, I'm in agreement with others about the quality of living here. Apartments are super-expensive here and in high demand. Celebrities like Regis Philbin, Jon Bon Jovi, Rosie O'Donnell, Jerry Seinfeld live in the neighborhood. I see famous people like them every once in a while, but not too often. However, in the past two months, I've seen Yoanna House of America's Top Model fame with the ubiquitous Tyra Banks at least six or seven times. Six out of those seven times were at Equinox in Columbus Circle. She ALWAYS does the ellipitical machine and she smiles a lot. I heard she had a bit of a weight problem before. Well, she certainly doesn't have that now. The last time I saw her was at Fairway. She had some salad, fruit, skim milk and other typical model body detox model food in her shopping cart. But then I saw her grab a dozen eggs. Hmmm...maybe Yoanna's a cook?

Speaking of America's Top Model and Tyra Banks, I think Tyra Banks is incredibly annoying. I think the most annoying thing about her is that she has this strong self-belief that everybody wants to BE her. I remember I was watching Oprah and Tyra Banks was on the show talking about how to make yourself look better. And all sorts of models came out stylized by Tyra. Then Tyra exclaimed, like Moses, "Everybody can have Tyra hair!"

Now having seen Yoanna just walking around the neighborhood like a normal person, she seems fairly approchable to me. If anything, seeing her now is mundane to me, not that it was ever that exciting.

The 60 Day Rule

I usually wake up to z100 in the mornings. I like the chemistry of Elvis Duran, John Bell, Danielle Monero and everyone else from the "Morning Zoo." They all have such distinctive voices and really can offer some insightful observations and comments.

One morning, a few weeks ago, I tuned into a discussion that the Morning Zoo was having about "The 60 Day Rule." That is, sixty days of no contact after a break up. Everyone on the radio was advocating it so that you'll keep your sanity. All the DJs were telling their own stories. For example, Danielle Monero talked about how she would check her cell phone 10 times every minute and take her phone with her to the gym and prop it up on the treadmill. Another girl on the show talked about how she would run home to see if there were any messages on her answering machine from her ex.

Then the guys on z100 began to take calls. This one girl, Rebecca, really stood out to me. She had just broken up with her boyfriend and was distraught. She really was a mess, and I really felt for her. She had recently gone through a breakup and she missed her ex terribly. She told the z100 guys that she couldn't stop thinking about him. She would check her phone 100 times day just to see if he sent a text message or called. Her ex would never talk to her anymore except for a "booty" call or to tell her about the other girls he has been meeting. Rebecca kept making excuses to the guys on the radio for her ex and was still hoping he'd come back. You could hear the fear, dread and panic in her voice. The saddest part was that the "60 Day Rule" was a grey area for her. She asked the radio guys, "Well, after the 60 days, then what? Who calls who?" She didn't seem to be getting it. The point of the "60 Day Rule" is to give you the opportunity to take control of a situation that has you reeling out of control.

A couple months ago, I was Rebecca. Now it's kind of complicated, but I wasn't really dating my last guy. Nonetheless, we were pretty close and he ended up breaking my heart. For a while, after the "puppy love" was over, I was the guy who wouldn't go away and he could still push my buttons. Finally, one day I told myself that I was really tired of the way he was treating me. I went through a detox from a guy who was always making me feel bad about myself by not talking to him anymore.

I'm better now and less sad. But I feel more empty. It's still hard for me to not think of him and "romanticize" my ended friendship with him. I haven't seen him in about a couple of months. I can't seem to remember what my guy looked like the last time I saw him. I remember a lot of other details. I remember the dvd I brought to his apartment and the dinner that I had made for him. I remember the guy playing "Imagine" on his guitar at the subway station, while I was waiting for the 7 train to take me to Queens. I remember how relatively warm it was that day. I remember the new dimmer light switch that my guy had just installed in his apartment. I remember trying to find something to reheat the pasta that I had brought for him and ended up using a pie pan to reheat it because he didn't have a microwave yet in his new apartment. I also remember leaving his apartment the next day and trying so hard to be cool and smiling at him when he genuinely smiled at me and said "Have a nice day."

These days, I almost feel as if I am telling myself I *should* feel sad because it's the expected way to feel and because I'm so scared that if I let go of the connection, then he really will be out of my life. I'm still so afraid to say that I've lost him, even though I know I really have. The tears are gone now. But I don't really have any emotion right now. Hopefully, soon I'll accept the situation and really move on.

America Gets It Right

This season on American Idol, America seems to actually be getting it right when voting off contestants. I still remember last season when that red-head Harry Connick Jr/Frank Sinatra wanna-be, John Stevens was on the show FOREVER. No amount of protests could get that guy off the stage.

This week, on "Love Song" week, Kellie Pickler gave the worst performance of the night, and America agreed. The judges called her a "robot" and they were right. That girl cannot crack a smile when she sings. She might as well have had botox injected all over her facial muscles since her face looked paralyzed while she sang "Unchained Melody." And I was getting really tired of her innocent, country-bumpkin act. While I don't doubt that she really is that dumb and naive, I do think she was shamelessly using it to stay on the show, making her not so innocent anymore.

So I was pretty happy she got voted off. None of the performances that night really wowed me. I thought Katherine was better than the judges thought. Chris gave a dependable and pretty good, rockish performance like he always does. Taylor should have sung "Up Where We Belong" because he's been imitating Joe Cocker all this time, and so he might as will sing something that shows his strengths. Paris really needs to pick better songs. She's got a great voice, but only once in a while has she picked a song that shows off her voice and her energy. Elliot, who my friend says looks like he has Down's Syndrome, which I think is hilarious, sang pretty well. But I just have not been that enamored with his voice in any of his performances. I think he sounds weird and almost tone-deaf sometimes. Paula, on the other hand, I swear was high or something. She kept blubbering on and on and gave this "stop the world," mascara-dripping "You move me" speech after Elliot sang. The look that Simon gave Paula after that bawling outburst was priceless.

Sometimes, American Idol can really stress you out.. But I've been pretty happy with this season. I think if Kevin Covais had become America's next idol, I would never speak to America again.

Another Holiday Post

I'm in San Francisco again this week working out of my company's SF office. I thought NY had been cold and rainy. It's like freaking Siberia here. Well, not that cold, but I clearly did not pack warmly enough. It was so cold, even away from the Bay, down in Silicon Valley where I was over the weekend. I was with a friend from college and I wanted to buy a thermal or a fleece or something since I didn't pack anything remotely long sleeve except for my dress shirts for work.

So I was on a mission on Sunday to find a clothing store like J. Crew or American Apparel. My friend and I were also looking for a brunch place. We drove from his apartment to Nini's Coffee Shop in San Mateo, but the place was closed for Easter. Then we went over to Burlingame, and we found a place open for brunch (but only till 4PM) where I had really good pancakes made with "Swedish Oatmeal." Swedish Oatmeal? I had never heard of that, but they made the texture of the pancakes really good, kind of a "rustic" quality.

After brunch, I went searching for my long-sleeve top. My friend and I walked down the main street of Burlingame. Burlingame has a Polo store, but that was closed. J. Crew was also closed. I walked into Banana Republic, but they just had sweaters and button down shirts, and no long-sleeve tshirts or fleeces. The Gap was open too, but I haven't walked into a Gap in over 5 years and I don't have any plans to change that. We also stopped by the Apple store in Burlingame because I wanted to buy an iPod USB cable, and that was closed too! After that, we had pretty much exhausted the open shopping in Burlingame. I was actually hoping to find an American Apparel because I really like their thermals and they're only $20.00 a piece and I buy them even though the CEO of that company is a total perv. My friend and I thought maybe there would be one at Stanford Mall. We drive over to the mall and the entire mall, except for maybe the restaurants, was closed. What is going on here? Things don't close in NY for Easter! If anything, we have sales, which is the most important feature of any holiday.

This is kind of funny to say, but it wasn't until this year that I realized that Easter is a big deal.

My "Career"

My friend in SF who I always visit when I'm out here has an xBox. Being the tennis player that I am, I'm obsessed with Topspin. This is the best tennis video game ever, and I keep telling my friend to get the xBox 360 so he can get Topspin 2.

Anyway, I was playing Topspin earlier today, and my friend was surfing the Net on his laptop. He came across some trivia website and started reading out loud to me the trivia questions. In the meantime, I was focusing on my match at the "American Open" (Topspin's version of the US Open). Topspin allows you to either play a player already created, like Lleyton Hewitt, Martina Hingis or Pete Sampras or create your own player in the "Career" mode. It's pretty sophisticated. You can choose the height, weight, hair style, and even facial features down to the lips and eyebrows. That day, I was playing a player I had made in "Career" mode. And I had gotten to the final of a GRAND SLAM and in a tiebreaker in the third set. This was going to be my breakthrough.

Then in the middle of answering the little quizzes that my friend was looking at on the website, Anna Kournikova (you can play against real players in this game) hit a passing shot by me and that was it. I had lost. 9-7 in a third-set tiebreaker. What a heartbreak. I chastized my friend for going on and on about this website he found. I was TRYING to focus on my career!

Thank You For Smoking

I saw Thank You For Smoking tonight. It was really entertaining. My favorite scenes were the scenes with the "MOD" Squad (Merchants of Death) and the scenes in LA. But the most priceless scene had to have been when Nick Naylor cross-examined on Career Day at his son's school a little girl who says her Mommy says that cigarettes can kill you. "Is your Mommy a doctor?", he asks. "Well that doesn't make your Mommy a very credible expert, does it?"

But I left the movie not really able to decide (and still haven't) whether Nick Naylor was a hero or a villain. On the one hand, he's the master of B.S. and seems amoral while advocating a hated cause. On the other hand, he does have his principles, is a loving father and is very self-aware of a lot of the bullshit that goes on in the world and the bullshit that he spews, particularly our government and is just trying to play the game.

I guess Mr. Naylor is somewhere in between.

Herbal Pressure

When it comes to my taste in food, I can be very ordinary. I mean, I can be a pretty adventurous eater. About the only thing I can think of on my "Foods That I Hate" list is Fennel or anything licorice-flavored. But I'm willing to give anything a try, even my hated Fennel. My favorite foods, though, are strong simple flavors without a lot of embellishment. My favorite meal to have any night of the week is a NY Strip steak with a good Bearnaise sauce on the side, a small green salad, and some slice of whole wheat baguette (I like whole grain breads). I like my steaks very underdone and I like to mix the red juices from the steak with the salad and sauce (I'm sure the vegetarians are turning sick to their stomachs reading this.)

For herbs, I'm actually not a huge fan of herbs. I tend to like the flavor of ground spices instead. If I had to name a favorite herb, I really just like flat leaf Italian parsley in just about any dish, which isn't the most exciting herb around. But some herbs are just essential. For example, basil and tomatoes are an obvious combination.

I'm actually not that big a fan of basil. I think it's a little too strong and I'm not sure I like the flavor all that much. But my main issue with basil, and a lot of other herbs for that matter, is how rapidly the stuff goes bad. I'll buy a huge bunch of Basil and then poof, two days later, it's black and slimy. I've tried everything--wrapping the leaves in wet paper towels and throwing them in the fridge; keeping a bunch in a vase full of water; putting it in airtight containers, etc. No matter what, the leaves go bad and unusable in about a couple of days. Everytime I buy basil, I feel this intense pressure. Am I going to use it in time??? Will it turn black??? How many things can I make with basil??? I know I could always make pesto, but I'm not a huge lover of pesto.

It's too bad I don't have a four season jungle in my backyard like the Barefoot Contessa or Michael Chiarello, or a backyard for that matter. I suppose I could try buying basil at Fairway and sticking it in a pot and growing it in my apartment since they sell it with the roots. But I don't want to stink up my apartment.

Such pressure.

The Biggest Holiday Of The Year

I meant to post this on Friday, but didn't get around to it. I suppose I could just change the date of this entry to be Friday, March 17, but that would be cheating.

At any rate, I never knew until last year how big of a deal St. Patrick's Day is to some people. I guess I don't really pay attention to too many holidays except for the major ones or the ones where I get a day off. But I remember talking to a coworker last year about how he was liking New York so far for the six or seven months that he had lived here. He told me he loved NYC and was telling me about all the great times he's been having. Then he told me that the best day he has had in New York was St. Patrick's Day.

St. Patrick's Day? It has never occurred to me to do anything for St. Patrick's Day. I knew people went out to the Irish pubs, and I think there's a parade, but I never thought that much about it. Well, my co-worker, who is Filipino by the way, said he had the best time and was going to have friends from out of town visit him for the next year. Wow, out of town visitors. That never crossed my mind either.

Sure enough, he had a bunch of people visiting from out of town, and invited me along. I declined. I went to the movies instead.

My New Years

I realize this is a little late, but I wanted to tell everyone how I spent New Years.

I was traveling back from San Francisco on New Year's Eve. My flight was supposed to leave at 11AM, but the Bay Area was having a really bad rain storm that was delaying all the flights. I had some tentative New Year's Plans, but nothing I would have been heartbroken over, if I had missed them. I just hate flying back East since you lose so much time and it's so late by the time you get back.

I thought I was never gonna get out of the airport. United kept delaying and delaying my flight. Every hour, it seemed that the gate agent was making another delay announcement. The other issue was that since SFO was in scheduling chaos, many flights, including mine, couldn't be properly staffed because flight attendants were stuck in the air or delayed getting to their next flight. I passed my time listening to my iPod, talking on the phone, and munching on some See's chocolates that I had bought at the airport stand originally as a gift, but I figured my friend wouldn't mind if I had some, or in my case, all of them.

Eventually, at around 4PM, PST, it was time to board. Our scheduled time of arrival in New York was 11:30PM, EST. But I knew there was no way I'd make it to any New Year's Party in time for the new year, unless there was a party at JFK. I could hear this guy who was still holding out hope and telling his friends on the phone that he was going to jump in a cab as soon as he got out of baggage claim and head all the way to Brooklyn from JFK just in time to see the ball drop on TV. I didn't really care though. I've never been a big New Year's person anyway.

The flight was completely full. Every seat on board was occupied since so many people were flying stand-by on my flight. After takeoff, the flight was pretty uneventful. The poor flight attendants were working really hard to keep everyone happy because they were understaffed too. After the meals and drinks were served (or "beverages" which I've always thought as a really gay word), we settled into our seats and watched the movie or slept.

A few hours later, a few minutes before 10PM, EST, one of the flight attendants made an announcement. Because there was very little chance that anybody on the flight would be able to celebrate New Years outside of the airport, the flight crew was going to celebrate with us. Since we were still in the air and wouldn't land till just before midnight, EST, we were going to "celebrate" New Year's in Santiago, Chile, where it was about to turn midnight. The crew started passing out champagne, and then the flight attendant said, "Ok, get ready to count down." We all counted down "10, 9, 8,.....Happy New Year!" and toasted each other.

It was so cute and a surprisingly nice way to spend New Year's Eve.

Today At The Gym

I woke up fairly early today for a Saturday. After puttering around my apartment for a bit, I decided to go to the gym. I belong to Equinox and the closest branches to me are 76th & Amsterdam and Columbus Circle. I prefer Columbus Circle because it's a bit more spacious and sharing the same building as Whole Foods is very convenient.

I decided to do some cardio that day and got on the treadmill. I kind of needed to clear my head and so running was good. I ran four miles and then got off the treadmill to cool down and towel myself down.

As I walked off the treadmills, I tuned into the TVs. Soon I was totally engrossed in The Real World/Road Rules challenge and stood there glued to the TV set even though there was no sound, just subtitles. While I was watching the show, I happened to be standing behind an elliptical machine. A woman soon approached me and asked "Excuse me, are you using this?" I replied "Oh, sorry. No."

So I moved out of the way. As I did so, my eyes were still glued to the TV. But I should have watched where I was going instead of the TV. I tripped over the elliptical machine I was standing behind, and knocked into the woman on the next machine and fell over her pedals. I braced my fall with my arms and ended up banging my right arm into a standing beam with a mirror surrounded by a metal frame that I scraped my elbow on. I also got a nasty bruise on my left quad from falling on the second elliptical machine. And my broken arm is also really sore. Everyone crowded around me and I was so embarrassed. I told everyone sheepishly, "I'm ok. Was just distracted by the tv..."

Real World isn't worth this much pain.

Gay Band-Aids

On Sunday night, I played tennis at the US National Tennis Center. I hadn't played since November and it felt really good to be on the court. I love playing tennis and just banging the ball away. It's one of the rare situations when I can really stop thinking about everything going on in my life and just think about hitting the ball.

Me and my friend were playing pretty hard that day. At first I was having a little trouble seeing the ball under the bright lights in the tennis court bubble. But soon I hit my groove and stopped framing the ball so much. We were having some pretty good rallies and both of us were hitting the ball hard and running each other back and forth. I soon started to get a couple of blisters on my hand. This always happens when I play tennis for the first time after a long break. I get them from the friction between my hand and the grip on my racquet. They always arise in the same place--lower bottom left corner of my palm and on the right side of my thumb.

I kept on playing because the pain wasn't that bad, but soon the blister at the bottom of my hand popped and I needed to find something to cover it up. My friend had a band-aid, but it wasn't really staying on. I decided to go to the front desk to see if they had a bigger Band-Aid. The guy at the front desk opened his first aid kit and started rummaging through there for a big enough bandage. Finally he handed me one. I thanked him and ran back to my court.

I tore off the wrapping. Oh my god. I never knew there was a such thing as a gay band-aid, but this was definitely the gayest band-aid I had ever seen. This wasn't your normal Johnson & Johnson Band-Aid. This was one of those "novelty" clear ones with a drawing on it. The drawing on the band-aid was this buff shirtless guy doing a volleyball spike over the net. My friend and I were laughing and commenting on the guy's physique.

Well, that band-aid didn't work that well either, but it worked well enough. As long as I held my racquet really tightly, my hand wouldn't hurt so much. The next day I bought some normal band-aids. Actually I bought waterproof band-aids, which are so awesome that I can't believe I've never heard of them before. And I was putting a cold pack on my hand the next day because it was still sore from my vise-like grip on my racquet.

Well all my pain and suffering was worth it. I got to play tennis and I got to wear a new gay accessory.

New Music

Like many people, I rarely buy CDs anymore. I get most of my music online. But I will buy the CD if it's by an up and coming new artist. I like to support artists who haven't made it yet and it makes me feel "in the know" since I can say to say all my friends, "Hey, have you heard that song? Oh you haven't? Well, let me tell you all about it!"

Last Thursday, I was having a pretty shitty day. I didn't go into work that day and just worked from home because I wanted to be left alone. I had my high school reunion that night, and contemplated not showing up, but I decided I should get out of the apartment. I didn't want to be a total hermit.

My reunion was at the Yale Club over by Grand Central. So I hopped on the 2/3 down to Times Square to eventually catch the S shuttle over to the East side. I know this trip well since it's the commute I take everyday to work. Since it was rush hour, there were lots of people running around in the stations.

As I was wading through the throngs of people at Times Square, I saw that a crowd had gathered in the big open area on the way to the S shuttle and the N/R/W trains. Oh great. Another musical performer. I really have no patience for crowds. That's the most annoying thing about New York--everything has a crowd or a long-ass line. When I see musical performers in the subway station and space made by the crowd so they can perform, I just walk right on through the space. I'm in a rush, and I have places where I need to be.

However, I always glance over and listen for the few seconds as I walk past the performers. And then usually I'm on my way. Since I was in such a depressed and crappy mood, I didn't expect to really be in the mood for any musical entertainment. This time, though, I stopped and listened for a few minutes and ended up staying for three songs. The girl's name is Susan Cagle. I really enjoyed her music and it definitely lifted my mood. Apparently she has an upcoming CD coming out on the Lefthook label with Sony/Columbia. Well I have now taken it upon myself to be a grassroots Susan Cagle promoter. I highly encourage everyone to check her out.

Seven things....

So I got tagged by Kristy. This is my first meme! Anyway, here we go:

Seven things to do before I die:
1. Go to business school.
2. Buy an apartment.
3. Get my six pack back.
4. Learn to surf and fence.
5. Reconcile with my parents.
6. Find someone to be with.
7. Be happy with my job.

Seven things I cannot do:
1. Be alone forever
2. Pass up the latest designer offering, especially if it’s on sale
3. Small talk
4. Hit on someone
5. Photograph well (i.e., my photogenic qualities)
6. Serve a tennis kick serve
7. Ski a double black run at Snowbird or any big ski resort out West

Seven things that attract me to blogging:
1. I’ve become more observant.
2. I’ve become more outgoing.
3. Feeling of being a “writer/journalist.”
4. Comments (Hint, hint to everyone who reads this blog.)
5. Gives me something to do when I’m bored at work.
6. Outlet to react in a human way to situations I see or am involved in.
7. Lets my friends know that I haven’t disappeared off the face of the earth.

Seven things I say most often:
1. like
2. I don’t care
3. I’m tired
4. What’s for dinner?
5. Wow
6. I guess
7. Cool

Seven books that I love:
1. Nobody’s Fool by Richard Russo (book & the movie)
2. New York Magazine (I know that’s not a book).
3. How to Eat by Nigella Lawson
4. The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
5. The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
6. Thirteen Days by Robert Kennedy
7. The Best Little Boy In The World Grows Up by Andrew Tobias

Seven movies that I can watch over and over again:
1. Sabrina (1995)
2. Ordinary People
3. Friends & Alias (Yeah, I know. Neither is a movie.)
4. Notting Hill
5. Quiz Show
6. Lord of the Rings trilogy
7. Indiana Jones trilogy

Happy (Belated) Chinese New Year

On Sunday, I kind of invited myself to dim sum with my friend, Colin. I just had a craving for it ever since I saw Mr. I-think-I'm-so-great Ming Tsai on TV couple weeks ago take a trip to Hong Kong. There, he went to the Floating Restaurant and had an amazing array of different dumplings and other little plates of dim sum. I was drooling at the sight and wanted to go for some as soon as I could.

I picked a bad weekend to go. First of all, I hate Chinatown. I can't stand the crowds, the screwed up streets, 200 year old people who walk way too slow buying who knows what and the cheap business owners there who don't take credit cards. All of this was exacerbated by the throngs of people for the Chinese New Year Parade. I don't know what my friends were thinking because they told me they specifically chose this restaurant because it was away from the parade hoopla. My friends must have been crazy because it was smack dab in the middle of the parade.

Anyway, I finally arrived and had a nice time enjoying the dim sum. Too bad you have to go all the way to Chinatown for it.

Brave New Gym

This month I've been going to the Reebok Sports Club on a free pass that I got in the mail. The Club sent it to me as a friendly "neighborhood" gift since I live 5 blocks away from the Club. My membership at Equinox had expired and so this was a good time for me to try out the ritzy Reebok Sports Club.

This club has everything. Basketball courts? Yep. Indoor Rock Climbing Wall? Got it. Outdoor track? Yep. And of course it has your standard free weights, machines, treadmills, ellipticals, like any other gym. It's really an impressive facility, which is good because you have to pay an arm and a leg to join there. The initiation is $1,200 and then you pay $188/month after that. I could have joined for only $600 initiation. Geez, what a bargain. And I thought Equinox was pricey.

With my free pass to the Reebok Sports Club, I could also visit any Sports Club LA in the city. One night, with my free pass in hand, I visited the Sports Club LA at Rockefeller Center. It's a little difficult to find, but eventually I found it and handed over my pass and went down to the locker room to change. I had brought a green Nike t shirt that day and a pair of navy blue shorts. As soon as I changed and locked my stuff up, I went back upstairs to the exercise area. Upstairs, I encountered a sea of grey t shirts and grey shorts. Oooooook....this is a little weird. Then I realized that everyone was wearing the same thing! Turns out the Sports Club LA (but not Reebok for whatever reason) lends you clothes to wear while you work out.

While I can see the convenience of this, especially going to the gym without lugging a gym bag around, it was really weird. Working out with 100s of people who are all dressed the same, and you're the oddball out because you're not wearing the gym's clothes is a very bizarre experience. I felt like they were all clones and I was going to be kicked out for not conforming.

To top it all off, when I got back to the locker room and passed by the desk where you can borrow clothes, I saw that you could also borrow jockstraps.

Ok, now THAT is going too far.

End of Physical Therapy

My arm is all healed now, and I had a very sad good-bye with my Physical Therapist. We hugged and planned to have dinner sometime. Throughout our months together, we gabbed about everything under the sun. I told her about my soap-opera love life; she bitched to me about her husband (jokingly--they're very happy togther.) I miss my sessions because a lot of my therapy was just a glorified massage on my broken arm, and also they were a nice break from work.

But now I have these metal plates in my broken arm for the rest of my life. On the day of my last appointment, I bought a copy of my Xray. It looks very dramatic. Two huge plates and 12 giant screws are now implanted in my arm. In a couple of years my doctor said I can have them removed. But why would I do that? It's proof of such a cool war story, although I do have my scars to show too. My doctor said that actually most people just have them stay in because removing them would require another surgery. Most people who get them out are people who might have a propensity to get injured again, like a football player, because the plates can really screw things up in the event of a reinjury.

Well, unless I feel any real pain, they're gonna stay in. For a while, leaving the house after my broken arm was like leaving the house with a huge pimple. But now I'm proud of my scars. They make me look tough, which is always nice.

Vanishing in the Colorado Mountains

I was in Aspen last week doing some skiing. I've never been there before. I had always avoided Aspen because of the logistics of getting there. The flights to Aspen are expensive and constantly delayed or cancelled. In fact, a lot of times the 30 minute flight from Denver to Aspen is more expensive than the 3 hour flight from New York to Denver.

Lo and behold my flight to Aspen was cancelled due to bad weather. We let out a collective groan when the pilot made the announcement. We were actually on the plane and in our seats at the time of the announcement. Apparently, visibility was only a quarter of a mile. Disgruntled, we gathered our things and got off the plane and made a mad rush for the Customer Service Counter (aka CSC, which now replaces "deplane" as my new favorite piece of flight lingo.)

When I got to the CSC, I learned that there was about 0.0000001% chance I'd make it to Aspen that day. There was a big snowstorm that was just dumping Aspen. Good for skiing, but not good for my transportation needs. I had to decide whether to find alternate means or just spend the night in Denver. I considered spending the night in Denver. I had never spent any time there before and thought it might be fun. I could experience true Rocky Mountain Hospitality instead of the faux, pretentious scene in Aspen or Vail or Beaver Creek (where I went last year.)

I eventually decided that I wanted to be in Aspen that night. I didn't want to lose the hotel room that I had already paid for that night. So I had to decide whether I was going to rent a car or take a shuttle service. Since driving for 4 1/2-5 hours in a snowstorm did not sound too appealing to me, I investigated the shuttles and joined an impromptu group of passengers and got on a van to Aspen.

Last year when I went to Beaver Creek, that was what I had chosen to do in the first place through Colorado Mountain Express, the main ground transportation service from Denver to all the ski resorts. They do a pretty brisk business and they have drivers running all over, back and forth between Denver and the ski resorts and between the ski resorts too.

Last year, when I was in Beaver Creek, I took the shuttle both ways. On my return trip, I took the last shuttle back to Denver, which was around 6:30PM. The driver picked me up at my hotel and loaded my bags. We picked up a couple more passengers and we were soon on our way. I had a late red-eye flight on sucky JetBlue back to New York that night and so I had plenty of time.

We were about an hour into our drive. So far the drive had been uneventful. I was sitting in the front seat and was pretty comfortable. I had my Bose headphones, my iPod, and a seat to myself. I even had room to recline since there was no one in the seat behind me. I didn't get a chance to strike up any conversations with any of my fellow passengers since I was up in the front myself. But that was ok since none of us were that talkative. No one had broken the ice yet.

So we were driving along I-70, when our driver pulled off the highway without saying a word to anyone on the van.. I kind of raised my eyebrow, but figured our driver needed to take a bathroom break or get gas. Plus since my flight was so late at night, I didn't really care about any delays.

The driver pulled on to an exit and we get off the exit to Bumblefuck, Colorado. Seriously, there was NOTHING around. Just trees and an occasional street lamp. There weren't even any buildings or other cars for that matter. We drove for a few more minutes and I thought maybe our driver had made a mistake and was going to turn around and get back on the highway to find another place. Instead, he turned off the dirt road we were on and pulled into a driveway of what looked like a high school. Ok, I thought to myself, he's gonna make a u-turn in the high school roundabout driveway. Instead he parked in front of the school, and jumped out of the van with parting words of "This will just take a sec", leaving us in the middle of nowhere. He ran behind what looked like a wall and disappeared.

No one really said anything after our driver left. Then a few minutes later, a girl in the back piped up and said "You guys, isn't this a little weird?" And we all said in unison "Uh....yeaaaahhhh." We all started to say "Where the hell are we? And where is our driver???" Then another girl in the back chimed in and said "I think someone should go out there." I turned around from my seat and said "Are you CRAZY? I'm not going out there." Then the girl said, "Yeah, it should be one of the guys who goes out there." Then another guy said in response "Oh come on, it's 2004, girls are every bit as strong as guys." Then we reached a compromise, if anyone was going out there, we were all going out there. Safety in numbers. We decided that if in ten minutes our driver wasn't back, we were gonna out and check on him. In the meantime, we started to wonder what the hell our driver was doing. Someone joked that a hidden camera was in our van to tape our reactions to this. "Yeah, we're being punked," someone said. Then I was like, "No, we're on Boiling Point!"

Just when we couldn't stand it any longer and were about to get out of the van, we see our driver running back to us. He opened the door, got in his seat, turned on the ignition and started driving, not saying a single word to us. We all looked at each other with raised eyebrows. When we were on our way, one of the girls asked "Um....are you ok?" Our driver just replied very matter-of-factly "Yeah, sorry. It was an emergency."

I can only speculate as to what went on. Probably the most reasonable explanation is that he had to do #2 or maybe he was sick and had to vomit. Or maybe he was meeting his "supplier" to transport something to Denver. Who knows. Anyway, I wasn't reported missing or anything and made it safe and sound to Denver International Airport. The world was lucky I made it through.

I Miss Everything...

The transit strike is long over now, but I saw a store the other day that had "Strike Sale" sign. I guess they didn't think it was too late to prey on people's frustration or sympathy. But I felt left out. I completely missed the transit strike in New York since I was in SF for the entire duration. The strike honestly wouldn't have affected me that much. I work from home a lot, and so I would have just stayed home if I had been in New York.

I also missed the blackout in the late Summer of 2003. I was in dumb old Australia. Actually I love Australia and I miss Sydney a lot. But I felt like everyone was having fun over in NY without me. I heard about street parties, celebrities hanging out with normal folk, free food from restaurants. Of course, I'm sure the people trapped in subways and elevators were none too pleased about the blackout especially during our typically scorching summer. But I didn't know any of them.

Taking a Break

I've got some stuff going on and will be taking a break from this blog for a little while. Hope everyone checks back when I start posting again.

Happy New Year.