Thursday, November 24, 2005

A real turkey day

Happy Thanksgiving y'all! So, I can't believe it--my mom's going to make a real Thanksgiving dinner. See, being Chinese and growing up in Kansas, we never had a real Thanksgiving dinner. Thanksgiving has always just been an excuse to invite the other Chinese families from Kansas over and cook more Chinese food. If I was lucky, I'd get some stir fry turkey or something like that. In high school, I would always go over to the McGuires in the evening to have some pumpkin pie just so I could have some taste of Thanksgiving. So you can understand what a shock it was to find out this week that my mom decided to have a traditional Thanksgiving dinner--turkey, gravy, yams and all. I'm sure there'll be a Chinese twist to it so we'll see. Big household to feed--a total of 15 people, including Betina's mother! Wonder if we're going to hit the Strip tonight...

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

flight delays

My flight was pretty nifty---last night, prior to going to bed, I finally decided--after some research--to buy & download this software called MyTVToGo which will easily convert my dvr-ms TV shows from Media Center onto the new Apple Video iPod that I got a few weeks back. All I can say is "sweet". Nothing beats a plane ride being able to catch up on Prison Break and Gray's Anatomy. I was really happy with the software and it couldn't have been any easier.

As for flight delays, my brother's flight is majorly delayed. He was supposed to leave Boston around 8pm but instead left at 10:52pm. Instead of arriving around 11:30pm, he's arriving now close to 1:19am. I'm the lucky one who volunteered to go pick him up...so here I am with all of my family asleep while I try oh so hard to stay up so I can pick him up. Ugh. [yawn]

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Time to travel

Ah, it's that time of year---Thanksgiving traveling. Matt's picking me up in 40 minutes to head to the airport where we will be headed to Vegas for the next 5 days to hang out with 12 of my relatives (eeks!). It will be one crowded house! All right-time to jump in the shower so I'm ready when Matt gets here.

Sunday, November 20, 2005

Weekend Wrapup

Friday, went to see the Death Cab for Cutie concert. Admittedly, I knew nothing about this band prior to the concert---really liked their music though and enjoyed the concert. They put on a good show. Afterwards, met up with Eric & Sri and we all went to get drinks at Fox Sports Grill until it closed.

Saturday, went to see tons of pictures at Matt & Jigna's of their recent trip to India...fun fun. Saw a bunch of people that I haven't seen in awhile...really nice to catch up.

Sunday, went to work at the movie theater! Asayo's husband, Matt's, family owns a bunch of cinemas and recently bought the Bellevue Galleria. After hearing the ins and outs of running a movie theater, a few of us volunteered to work a few hours. I mostly did ticketing and it was actually a really fun experience. It was really interesting to get the perspective from the other side. I loved getting the tour of the movie projection rooms--completely fascinating. We ended up watching Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire as a treat in the end--yay!

Thursday, November 17, 2005

kayak.com launches multi-city

I've been using a lil' website called kayak.com for a few months now to check out flights. It's a pure service-based search engine website that will search *across* tons of different websites to find the best deals. They don't book the flights themselves---incentive is just to find the best deal..for you. It's not like Expedia where it can only show airlines that they've made deals with--it just searches across diferent websites...so it includes results from airlines like jetblue and song airlines and southwest---airlines that typically don't appear in Expedia or Travelocity. It's awesome. Anyway, they just launched multi-city search tonight plus they added themes and regions to their "Buzz" feature, which shows quick results for the top 25 search requests for certain areas. They really rock and I can't wait to see what more they decide to do with their website. Looking for a flight? Check out kayak.com.

warding off the sickness

Woke up this morning feeling my throat more constricted...nothing too bad, but I left work early just in case to ward off any sickness that may be trying to invade my body. Ick Ick Ick--hope I don't get sick. I've been amazingly healthy so far this flu season, considering my history. Knock on wood.

Monday, November 14, 2005

Spa & Restaurant Review: Ummelina & Campagne

Matt and I have been with each other for a year now--woo hoo. We celebrated by just spending a relaxing day at the spa and taking advantage of the 25 for $25 menu at Campagne.

We decided to go to the Ummelina International Day Spa downtown where we got the Pacific Rim package, including a massage, and he got a pedicure while I got a facial. Overall, my thoughts...
Pros:
  • Great location, it's downtown
  • I love the international theme--smells great inside, nice decor
  • AMAZING massage. Really great therapist--was very impressed. She spent a good amount of time giving me a nice, deep massage and really working out the kinks in my shoulders.
  • I was also really happy with my facial. For the first time, I had a male skin aesthetician and he was awesome. He warmed up every cleanser & moisturizer he put on my face so it was really relaxing the entire time. He also gave a nice hand and foot massage. Interestingly, Ummelina doesn't like to manually remove skin impurities like other salons do; instead, they prefer to use a gentle fruit enzyme peel for top exfoliation. Something to keep in mind if that's something that's important to you for getting a facial.

    Cons:
  • Because it's downtown, space is limited and they didn't have enough space for everyone to sit in the waiting area/lounge. When we arrived, we had to go into this temporary overflow area, which was in some tea cafe that no one was in. Furthermore, it was right next to a door that led outside--so it was rather awkward to be sitting in a spa robe all on display. Plus, some guy who was changing the towels kept coming through. Not really fun. They eventually cleared up and moved us into the main lounge, which was much nicer--but they definitely need to find a better overflow area
  • Walls are thin. The room I got the massage in was right next to a room that had a multi-jet shower. Halfway through my massage, someone started taking a shower and it was like the pipes were bursting through my ears...it was really loud. I could also clearly hear anyone talking in that next room. It's rather disruptive during a massage--they should've planned better and perhaps had all the massage & facial rooms on one side.
  • The changing area is small and unisex, which was odd for me---most spas have separate male & female changing areas. Also, there wasn't a shower or anything in the changing area for after a service to clean out the oil that was used. I thought that was anoying.

    Overall, I think the major issues with Ummelina are due primarily to their limited space as a result of being a downtown business; however, I was really happy with the services and would return again.

    Dinner at Campagne was lovely and romantic as expected. The service was so-so with the waitress being rather hands-off with us but diligent at her job. I ordered a chicken dumpling in mushroom sauce appetizer and a duck confit entree. Matt ordered the Saveurs du Provence appetizer and Boeuf Bourguignon entree. I thought my dumplings were delicious but nothing special. The duck was rather tasty and moist but the squash gratin that accompanied it--while yummy, I felt the duck jus that surrounded the dish degraded the taste. Matt felt his appetizer was too salty with the olive tapenade taking over the flavor..and the beef dish a bit on the dry side. We both finished off with a Gâteau aux Chocolat dessert, which was very good. Overall, food was average--thank goodness it was a $25 meal. I think I would've expected more had it been at regular price. I loved the atmosphere as we sat right at the window, in front of the Public Market sign that so defines Seattle. I'd return again as the other dishes on the menu looked quite good.
  • Wednesday, November 9, 2005

    The votes are in

    Election Day was yesterday---I came home and had 15 minutes to run to the nearest poll. I grabbed my keys and ran down the street with less than 5 minutes left before the polls closed. Got inside--
    "Did I make it in time?!"
    "You sure did! We were just about to close up!"
    "Great--I don't know what my voter id number is though.."
    "No problem, do you have ID on you? That's the new rule this year."
    "Oh crap. My ID. I just grabbed my keys and ran down here"

    I knew I didn't have enough time to run home and come back. I fumbled around my pockets hoping that I had my Microsoft badge somewhere on me..but I didn't. Just my keys...but then...
    "Wait--I have this gym membership card! It has my name on it..."
    "Oh, I live next to that gym! Hm..."
    "Will it work?"
    "It's a stretch..but you look desperate to vote...all right.."

    Yay!

    In the end, we voted to
  • Keep the gas tax to rebuild a bunch of transportation problems (yay)
  • Ban smoking in public places & workplaces and within 25 feet of doors, windows & vents (yay, although I'm still annoyed about the 25 feet bit)
  • Ban the Monorail (although tax payers still have to pay the monorail vehicle tax for the next 2 years to pay off the debt it had accumulated) (boo)
  • Keep Mayor Nickels around longer (sure)
  • Say no to both medical malpractice initiatives (sure)
  • Sunday, November 6, 2005

    A Philanthropic and Relaxing Weekend

    The weekend started with a bang by attending the Emerald City Swank, Seattle Works' annual fundraiser. I went last year with Gary and had a blast--this year, Kabir and I organized 2 tables worth of our friends (Sri also got a table of people from work). Seattle Works is an organization dedicated to encouraging people in their 20s and 30s to volunteer and contribute to the community--so as you can imagine, it was an evening filled with the hipsters of Seattle partaking in auction bidding, dinner and dancing. The silent and live auctions had so many items--I walked away with 3 things: a set of cheese knives with a bottle of wine, a trip to the San Juans, and a trivia night which I got with Spencer for our work team. The biggest ticket item was a cruise for 2 to Alaska which went for $4700. That's $4700! Coming from people my age--not some rich 60 year old millionaire! It's just a great evening seeing how much money people in our age bracket are willing to donate to a great cause (in exchange for, in some cases, a great prize!). A pair of Death Cab for Cutie tickets went for over $3000 and gift certificates to local restaurants easily went for hundreds of dollars. Totally amazing. Check out photos from the evening.

    On Saturday, when it was raining all day and super blah, Sri and I drove up to Lynwood to check out the new Olympus Spa. We've been long time fans of the spa located in Tacoma and were eager to see what the new one offered. Oh boy--it was so different! Some things to point out:
  • Very modern, open, spacious and clean
  • There are only 4 pools at the following temperatures: 60, 90, 97 and 104. Unlike the one in Tacoma, there are no small pools already infused with Mugwoorts. They do, however, have Mugwoorts infused water that you can scoop and pour on yourself, similar to the one in Tacoma.
  • The body scrub area surrounds 2 sides of the pool area and feels a bit more private with bamboo hangings separating each bed.
  • There are more facial services
  • There's a free skin consultation service
  • They offer manicures & pedicures, unlike the one in Tacoma
  • The restaurant is much bigger with a lot more menu items (I had a really yummy Japchae)--additionally, they have a juice bar!
  • They have more earth energy rooms--2 of which are cold! (a Chill room and a Cabin room at 75 degrees). Similar to the one in Tacoma, they have the Salt, Sand, and Mud & Jade Rooms--but they also have a Charcoal and Elyian Stone room.
  • They also added a cool Korean Tea Service where you can learn the tradition of participating in a Korean tea ceremony.

    Ladies--any of you that have tried the Olympus Spa in Tacoma should totally check out this one in Lynwood. It's closer and just awesome. One caveat--they raised the entrance fee for the Lynwood location: it's $30 (as opposed to $25 in Tacoma) but it's well worth it!
  • Friday, November 4, 2005

    Some new things to check out

    Microsoft's Live.com -- users can customize content and add things like weather, horoscopes, hotmail, blog feeds and news...quite similar to My Yahoo. My initial thoughts---the good things that make this service stick out: the ability to include RSS feeds as part of the page and the ability for software developers to develop "gadgets" for use on these pages. What I don't like: the layout. While it's cool to choose 2-column vs. 3 column vs. 4 columns, Microsoft has decided to make each of the columns be spaced evenly, which I don't think works well for the eye and the user. At least one column should be wider than the others so it can be the center of attention with other columns being more side information. As a result, the even sized columns makes the page seem too busy for me. I also didn't find that it did a good job of maintaining my content and settings when I went to another computer. I tested this out at work and then went home...and found the page to be different from when I had set it at work (i.e. something as simple as setting up my Weather cities was gone). Given--this is all in beta mode. It'll be interesting to see if this takes off.

    Amazon's Mechanical Turk. The basic premise -- Complete simple tasks that people do better than computers. And, get paid for it. This web service solves the problem of building applications that until now have not worked well because they lack human intelligence. Humans are more effective at solving certain problems over computers such as finding the pizza in the picture. This Beta program just launched and initially has been filled with requests made by, of course, Amazon.com. Primarily, the requests have been to correct A9.com Yellow Page photos and to create product descriptions for the new Automotive Parts store---both things that are not easily generated by a computer. I find this concept extremely fascinating and can't wait to see how this takes off. I already made a whopping 33 cents from correcting a few photos. Neat. Now, hopefully some higher paying tasks will come in the queue that I can do (unfortunately, I'm not good at describing automotive parts)

    Rain Rain Go Away

    It's been raining ALL WEEK LONG in Seattle...coinciding with the turning back of time and leaving work in complete darkness. Darkness coupled with constant rain makes for horrible commutes leaving Redmond to go back to Seattle. No wonder I need coffee everyday to get through the day. On the bright side, the sudden onslaught of rain with the sudden dip in temperature has resulted in a number of ski resorts to open up early! Crystal opens today and Blackcomb opens this weekend--with Baker and Stevens opening early next week. Sweet! Maybe just maybe this year will be better than last's.

    It's finally Friday and I'll be ending the week by attending Seattle Works' Emerald City Swank, their annual fundraiser. I went last year and it's a really fun event. Best of all, it's just awesome seeing so many people in their 20's and 30's giving money to charity and wanting to contribute to the community. Sri, Kabir & I together got 33 people to attend, spread across 3 tables--yay! The live auction is the most insane with people willing to give thousands for one item when it's worth way less...all because it's a good cause. You definitely leave with a good feeling. Wonder if I'll win anything this year...

    Tuesday, November 1, 2005

    Moohaha Brewhaha

    Weekend was a blast with a super successful party thrown together with Kutta. This year's party was way bigger than last year's, with more than a hundred people overall showing up throughout the evening. I'd say the majority of people were in costume (I can only think of 2 or 3 people that were not) so it was certainly entertaining seeing how creative people got. There were a few witches, lots of pimps, a few Catholic schoolgirls, Towelie from South Park, Napoleon Dynamite, 2 Hunter S. Thompsons, the list goes on....Thanks to everyone who came out for my Halloween party!