The soothing effects of Ira Glass

Last weekend, I gladly took on the responsibilty of house-sitter and dog-sitter for one of my aunts. My aunt has Jack, a Maltese mix, who is very cute and friendly. He's one of those dogs who would open the door for burglars if they could. Thank goodness for the canine's lack of opposable thumbs and the ability to walk upright.

On my last night at the house, after many unsuccesful attempts of watching TV and in the process, missing the return of "SNL" (can't deal with those HDTV's, damn you controllers!), I decided to tune in to NPR. It was only almost-10pm and I was just in time to catch the re-broadcast of "This American Life" and later, my favorite, "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me...". Let me say again that Jack is a very happy and VERY active dog, but as soon as Ira Glass started talking this started to happen:

And right before the first act, this happened:

I don't remember much after I took that picture, I woke up at 1am cuddled next to Jack.

"Fairplay to those who dream..."

The 80th Academy Awards concluded a couple of hours ago, and in a couple more hours, I will be reading innumerable posts about said awards show: winners, highlights, red carpet reports and such. For me, it was an awesome installment of an otherwise tired annual award ceremony. It was still very Hollywood, yet very refreshing (I don't know, it's probably just me, but the the recent conclusion of the writer's strike made this Oscar's special in a way). There were no American winners for any of the acting awards. Tilda Swinton, a Scot, got the nod for Best Supporting Actress; Javier Bardem, a Spaniard, won Best Actor; Marion Cotillard from France won Best Actress and Irish Daniel Day Lewis, unsurprisingly received the Best Actor trophy. I'm not sure if I'm placing unnecessary significance over this turn of events, but it made the show a lot less Hollywood (I know, I've already said that but hello? Cameron Diaz? Again?! and creepy Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus) and more about the celebration of films, or movies (whatever).

One of the highlights for me (I have two) was another Irish winner, or should I say winners: Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova, taking home the golden boy for Best Song, Falling Slowly, from the movie Once. I told myself to write something about this movie. It's one of my favorite movies that came out last year (although I only saw it two weeks ago). I like simple things and nothing can be more simple than a story about a guy and girl who met and made good music together. I don't know what else to say... IT'S FUCKING BRILLIANT! (it's an Irish movie, I think it's OK to say this). Here's them performing "Falling Slowly":

And the other highlight for me is Jon Stewart giving an extra minute or two to Marketa to give her speech, as she was abruptly cut-off by the musicians before she could ever say her thanks. I love you Jon Stewart, you've one-upped Stephen Colbert in my book on this special night.

There was really one thing that I skipped as soon as I saw it on TV, it was this guy. I don't know, it's probably just me, but I don't like Jerry Seinfeld... maybe because I never got really into the nothingness of "Seinfeld" (oh, btw, I don't like Jason Alexander and that guy who got heckled... I'm on the fence with that lady who has a rich dad). It might also be that I got sick from all the Bee Movie shorts they showed on NBC. The downside of skipping that was that I never found out who won Best Animated Film, short or full-length (it also doesn't help tuning in late to the show). Oh well, I'm sure I'll find out in a bit.

Ed's note: So, apparently, it wasn't Jon Stewart who decided to bring Marketa back (it was the producer), nevertheless, I still heart him.

Quest for the Best Crab Cake - Issue No.1

I wanted this first issue to be special, was originally planning to write it over the weekend -- but due to some previously-contracted obligation, I will be strapped for time and unable to make this first review as in-depth as I want it to be. Anyway, I guess that's fine, the reality is, this is the best that I can do writing-wise so really, I was just BS-ing. Moving on.

Last Wednesday, my department treated out a customer to lunch. It was his birthday a couple of days back and since he is a pretty OK customer, my boss decided to take him out. I was there for the free lunch, of course. We went to this place:

It's a cool place... it has decent water views, patio dining, and has been in business for a bit (Oracle is nearby so it's never short of people on business lunches or dinners).

On to the really good stuff, so I ordered "Fresh Dungeness Crab Cakes". It has organic greens, crab-avocado salad, organic cherry tomatoes and "Louis" dressing. The sad part was that I didn't get to take a picture of the [spoiler alert] scrumptious meal. I guess I was a bit embarrassed to do it since it was kind of a business lunch.

The presentation was great. Two crab cakes (drizzled with the "Louis" dressing) were placed on top of the bed of greens, a good scoop of the crab-avocado salad sat between them. Crab-avocado salad was great. Very light and the avocado was the right amount, not too overpowering with it's creaminess. The crab cakes were utterly delightful. The crust was perfect, the crab meat "almost" perfect. The dressing was great (a little goes a long way). And yes, I did clean my plate pretty well... not a morsel of anything left. One big negative though: they didn't use lump crab meat. I guess that's the most they can do with with mostly frozen Dungeness crab available in the market. Oh well, I still have to take points off for that.

Verdict:


May I also suggest their Shrimp bisque. It was so good. I personally will go back and try the other seafood dishes.

Simpsons Alert!

If you're a Simpsons fan. You better check THIS out... or else, um, nothing really, I just really want you to take a look at it. That's all. I just thought it's cool and all. Ktnxby.

Crab cakes and me

On my profile, I mentioned that I like crab cakes. Let me retract that, I don't just like crab cakes... I LOVE crab cakes. And with this love for crab cakes, I thought I should go on a quest to find the best one out there. Well, "relatively" the best one, since it would be the best according to my taste alone.

I have been planning to formally document this quest and thanks to this blog that no one ever reads, I will have the ability to grade crab cakes on an ongoing basis... until I croak, probably (unless my kin wants to take on the daunting task). Anyway, I like keeping things as simple as possible, so I figured that I should grade the crab cakes on a scale of one crab for awful to five crabs for excellent.

The lovely crab*

And for the worst of the worst, the most dreadful crab cake, a special grade of imitation crab would be awarded:

The despicable imitation crab

*I had to make my own on MS Paint... I initially used this thing that I got off Google but I think he sells it to people, so to avoid future lawsuits, I decided to draw my own. The same cannot be said about the imitation crab... I can't draw junk like that.

My first review will be posted soon. I just had a big lunch earlier with people from work. Review to follow.

My night with Barry...

I wish I could've been more creative with the title, but it's hard to come up with words to explain what happened Friday night. Awesome? Yup. Delightful? Most definitely. I guess I'll just let the pictures do the talking. Oh, and besides the stage view, all the pictures were taken after the event. We were running late (what's new?). Anyway, without further ado:

Glitter animation a must do!

The Venue

My view from the top

Ok, so about the crowd. I think there were five major demo groups (not necessarily exclusive of each other, i.e. they may overlap in traits) in this musical event: 1) Our beloved senior citizens; 2) Baby boomers; 3) Our gay friends; 4) My Filipino brothers and sisters; 5) Kids who were forced to be taken along for the awesome ride because of the lack of babysitters. Also, the plethora of walking aids were obvious, I was glad Mr. Manilow got to lure them out of their usual confinements.

Enjoyed your popcorn much?

I tried to brush by her.

Some ladies in red hats. I think they're part of a mob or something.

The Fanilows

I tried to take pictures of the other demo group I mentioned, but I was not able to do so. And, even if I didn't get to purchase any souvenirs (because I'm broke), I took pictures of these things I will be looking forward to purchasing... 20 years from now:

And the pièce de résistance:

All in all, it was a great evening. I got to sing a long to most of the tunes... got kinda teary-eyed with a couple of them.

Pwede na pala ang Filipino...

I don't get it. What difference does it really make? Like, I can always start rambling in "Filipino", pero wala naman sigurong mangyayaring kakaiba. Huhulihin ba ako ng punong blogger ng Blogspot para ipatigil ang aking ginagawa? I don't think so. Anyway, it's just weird. But then again, I am really a novice at blogging and I am not computer-savvy as well. So this might have something to do with settings... and I never get anything "customized". Templates are fine by me.

But if anyone can hear me, what does this really mean???