unpacking...

As I continue to "unpack", nearly a week later, I came across some fun little stuff I stashed away...

From Hotel Nikko room service, little cards were placed with my pillow mints/chocolates:

the first night read-
"Laughter cannot bring back what anger has driven away."

the second night read-
"When you have completed 95% of your journey, you are halfway there."

Just thought I'd share those. Neat-o huh?

And for funner stuff, I visited the Musee Mecanique at Pier 45 (It used to be located at the Historic Cliff house- where I first visited it, and where is actually also featured in The Princess Diaries)... and played some of the 'fortune telling/psychic' machines for kicks:

"You have been faced with some tragedy in the past. Things will look brighter in the future. There will be a rift between you and a dear friend, but that will be patched up and your friendship will be stronger than ever." [Well! This one is kind of all over the place]

"You are a born leader, with a sense of justice and good memory. Firm in any conviction. Home loving, dependable and devoted to family and friend... Temperamental personality and desirous of being frank..."

THEN I found a business card I stashed away for Kara's Cupcakes, located in Ghiradelli Square. Reminded me a lot of Sprinkles Cupcakes design/graphic-wise, but I didn't have time to try any (as seemed like the trend of my trip) since we were off for sundaes at the Ghiradelli Ice Cream Parlor! [Sorry no pictures... I was pretty bad about that throughout the trip too.]

Birthday Fun!

This year I went (and am still going) overboard for my birthday. I had a bday trip up to SF, then a bday dinner, and soon a bday pool/bbq party! And in between all that, I had a FABULOUS day at work for my bday. It was fantastical!

So to begin my bday adventures, I visited fr'isco (as seen in the previous post). And I must say, I am a major fan of the Ferry Building. It is a magical place with all sorts of foods! I should have taken more pictures... but oh well, what can you do.

So mainly I went to the Ferry Building to find this cute sweets shop- Miette Patisserie. Since I've been drooling over cake stands, modern/kitschy/cute/vintage, for a while now, I was REALLY tempted to buy one of their cake stands. But that would have been a bad idea given my lack of packing space. So, next time, cake stand... next time.

The cakes and pastries, like the shop front, look so sweet and cute and good! I will be sure to try some next time. I should have timed my meals more appropriately that day.

Other shops in the Ferry building consisted of a chocolate shop, more confections, fresh meats, herbs, mushrooms, a tea house, cheese shop, and all things utterly and totally foodie!

My favorite part of hoteling is ALWAYS the room service... yes, it costs a pretty penny, but when on vacation... do as vacationers do. SPLURGE.

So, we ordered in some edamame (to be "healthy"), a raved about mushroom and pepperoni pizza, fried calamari with a chili oil dipping sauce (which really reminded me of some type of dim-sum), and of course, who can resist getting some chicken nuggets and fries. My favorite was the pizza... I would have enjoyed the calamari more if it wasn't so salty.

The most massive meal I had was at Max's diner...
Chicken Pot Pie that is pretty much made as large as a normal WHOLE pie. Good, but geezus, it was HUGE.

and never one to skip out on Max's Strawberry Shortcake when in season, we had to get a 1/2 slice. YUM.

Back in Orange County, on my actual birthday, my wonderful work peoples took me out to lunch to the Slidebar in Downtown Fullerton. I had "The" Mac n Cheese. But the most eye popping, jaw dropping, was the dessert... i forget the name, but it was a brownie sandwich with cookiedough between the layers, DEEP FRIED, topped with vanilla ice cream. Yummy? yes... A heartstopper? you betcha.

Then, for dinner, a mere 5 hours later (which really isn't enough to digest a meal of seismic proportions from the Slidebar), I had dinner at Cafe Tu Tu Tango at the Block in Orange. Food pics and comments can be found on my most favorite food blogger's page here. It may have been the novelty of the idea that's worn off... but it just wasn't as good this time around. Oh wells, it was spending time with friends that really mattered. :)

Oddly enough, and to my surprise... I didn't eat a CAKE at all on my birthday. I'll make sure to remedy that during my pool/bbq party. Ice cream cake... here I come!

teaser!

... more to come!

home sweet home

I finally got a chance to park it in front of the tube and chow down tonight...
it's TACO TUESDAY! so i had 3 tacos with a macho coke from Del Taco...
then I proceed to inhale some leftovers from a previous dining excursion:

Grillin' Chicken Sandwich with Sweet Potato Fries from the Veggie Grill

(leftovers did NOT do the fresh sandwich justice... but when are leftovers just as good as the original?) Cilantro Pesto = YUM. Chipotle Ranch = YUM. Cute eco-friendly take-out box= AWESOME.

And to finish off the evening, a bowl of Rocky Road. YUM.

experimentation

so... again, i haven't eaten at home or cooked/baked anything for a week. and that's dumb. The next chance I get, I am going to make chocolate chip cookies. I'm going to experiment with them mainly based on what I read in this article. Hopefully, I will do it this week, but this "experiment" takes some commitment. We'll see.... :)

torn

ahhhh the puppups and the penguins.... I can't choose!

procrastination gives you 40 cents

So, remember way back when... when I was collecting recipes out of my Real Simple magazines so that I could sell them for a small amount of change?

WELL. change I did get. 40 cents to be exact. 4 issues for 10 cents each = 40 cents total

I lugged literally 3 trader joe paper bags full of magazines to the used book/mag/cd/etc store... aaaaaaaand they only took magazines up to 6 months past, and also had some other scale of magazine selection. So out of all that, they took 4. I guess, I should have sold back earlier like in 2007 when I was still consistently buying the magazine monthly... but nope. Whatevs. (This kind of situation happens to me with Buffalo Exchange too... no one ever wants my stuff. WHY OH WHY.)

On the brightside, I'm "sloughing off the excess to find my center"...

quote from Uptown Girls... gotta love that movie!

... so I feel better now that I don't have that massive amount of magazines in my room. But knowing me, I'll buy something else to take up space. Ridiculous, really.

Anyways, nothing food related. I have a picture of a cream puff from Beard Papa's... but that's really about it. Probably won't be any post with food tomorrow either since I'm dining out! (again...)