...so Deborah had to be my GPS

...to Verdi's house for dinner

I expected to stay home and do the powerpoint for the group presentation next week, but Verdi's invitation to dinner extended to me too! It was impolite to refuse so Amanda, Lois and I got a ride to his house in Costa Mesa.

It was not a sit-down kind of dinner, but the stand up and cook and eat and drink at the same time kind. Like those they have in Turkey, where Verdi comes from. Good music in the background (Maroon 5, James Blunt, the Beatles), good conversation, and a nice viewing of pictures from the others' Yosemite trip. The whole thing lasted about 4plus hours, til 1245am!

Menu (so you can see that my appetite has increased):
-Guacamole
-Tortilla Chips x many many
-Tomato and Cucumber Salad x muchmuch
-DIY Burrito x 2
-Fish steak x 1
-Leftovers Soup x 1 bowl
-Wine/Orange+Mango Juice x 2 glasses
-Herbal Tea that was mostly an Oregano infusion x 1 mug

Amanda making the guacamole

Lois preparing the tomatoes for the burrito

Verdi making the fish

Busy in the kitchen!

Food!

My first burrito.

My second burrito.

making the burritos.

The wine we drank.

Soup made from the leftovers of the food cos we couldn't finish all of it!

...and cooked another successful dish!

I read stuff on Israel and Homeland Security until my eyes wanted to die, today. My housemate commented "Wow. You like study more here than at home?" Cos it seems like most of my time is spent reading while they've been day-tripping to Newport Beach and Balboa Island (They're like, whatever, about their classes cos writing papers is slack. Don't need references and all the extra stuff NUS makes us do.) Grr.

The rest of the evening/night was spent largely on cooking Beef and Squash - a personal favourite. recipe from Mum.

I peeled 5 squash in 1.5 hours. With that big knife cos don't have any smaller. Pain ah! Relieved the boredom and motivated to cook by watching Ratatouille.

See the amount of squash? To match the amount of beef so don't have to refreeze it. Had to chop the garlic and onions on a PLATE. Should have wished for a chopping board at Christmas.

First add the beef...

Then add the squah. The pot is FULL.

Final Product! To coincide with the end of Ratatouille. I took that the same time as the length of the movie to cook?! Could have finished another reading if I just fried eggs! Naaahhh, satisfaction experienced and nutrition absorbed - incomparable.

Off to San Diego tomorrow! Visiting factory outlets, the Zoo, the Wildlife Park, hopefully watch a live band, and ride a tram!

...and Skyped with Deborah!

That lucky girl got to go to UC Berkeley, place of elite snobs who shiver in the face of the cold Californian north.

Candy are you jealous I skyped with your favourite junior??

Who uses Skype for a mirror, anyway?
Now you see her..
Now you don't.
(Hallies: Check out a Berkeley dorm room!)

It was like a sugarcane moment in those secondary school days. Cracking up every few minutes from nonsensical ramblings, but at the mercy of the dreaded service provider which kept dropping the call! Goody, another person to rescue me from the insipid continuity of school and studying while the rest of the world slumbers, literally.

Is it obvious I don't wanna do my readings? Even if I spend all night and all tomorrow studying I might not get next week's readings done.

On a brighter note, take a look at my dinner! Which Deb was about to kill me for cos she was dying of hunger. Maybe that's why she ABANDONED me for a movie.

Note to Xiaoyun: I get the scary uppercase typing syndrome from her.

"Double double, toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble..."

Chicken from Wholesome Choice[persian supermarket across the road], Rice and Beef Soup self-cooked, Water self-poured.

...and finally finished watching the Little Nyonya.

Thanks to Eileen for being 'around' when I was watching, so I could complain and be shocked and have someone to tell about it. haha. It was so much more fun watching it in hall with the Block 5 kids and Daphne.

How could Yuzhu turn out that way?!?!

For all the build up and tying up of the different ends of the story, the last two episodes were soooo draaaagggyyyyyy. And quite predictable. oh well. It was entertaining while it lasted.

Now I'm sort of hooked on Parental Guidance by MediaCorp. Past all the accents that Singaporeans usually wouldn't have, it's really funny!! Love Chua Enlai's character. And Adrian Pang's acting. The series is not bad, one of the nicest since Under One Roof.

Waiting for the beef ribs to defrost so I can cook soup.

Finished all but two of the earlier posts. Is this enough blogging for you?? Is it?!

...and want to sleep after doing lots of stuff over the weekend

I'm so tired from doing everything but sleep. Lots of readings to do before tomorrow. "only 39 pages from the textbook!" -the Teaching Assistant. Yeah right. Thanks.

Ok quick update of what's been happening so far.

Thursday after I burnt my pot:
-Went to the Christian Students @ UCI meeting and had dinner, sang some songs, and got introduced to their group. Met new people there, these 2 women from China who were there cos one was a Prof's wife and the other's doing her postgrad I think. I had to dust off my rusty Chinese and use it :|

-Met Pa and went back to Simi Valley to visit Uncle Ferdy and Auntie Nida. Filipino food! They gave me a much thicker sleeping bag, a cushion, a bugger and better pot, and a frying pan. Yay! Can cook more things now :) without burning them :)

The oranges are from their own garden.

-Slept overnight at the Hilton Hotel in Costa Mesa so that I could watch TV, although there was nothing on.


Friday:

-Grocery shopping before Papa had to catch his flight home. The place is stocked with meat and veg and milk!

-Amanda's friend Christa dropped by to hang out with us cos she had nothing to do. She's a Filipina in the US Army (like, what's wrong with her right) and is really funny. She gave us a whole bag of Doritos and shortbread so we have snacks for next week! Played Dutch Blitz until she had to go home

Christa, Lois and Amanda with the Dutch Blitz cards.

-Yvette and Ka Ho arrived shortly after Christa left. Cleaned up the roasted chicken from the supermarket. Then played Citadel (I won the first game!) until...

-Debbie called and asked if we wanted to go for her home meeting. Alors, in HALF AN HOUR I had to get ready and cook dinner cos I said I would. Fried pork chops! Lois and Amanda finished most of it.

-Yvette and I went for the meeting which was actually a cell group meeting (from the Church in Irvine. yes that's the name.) with lots of eating and a time of fellowship discussing the material they had been going through on Jacob. The hymns they sang were nice, and the style of praise and worship is really different from what I'm used to, even with all the different churches I've visited. But the thing I took away from it is that it doesn't matter HOW or WHAT is done as long as the people CARE. They were very friendly and tried to include us in their conversations and made us eat ALOT. there was even beancurd from 99 Ranch [chinese supermarket] for dessert!

Saturday:

-visited the Farmers' Market and had a blast trying all the samples and watching the vendors entertain and entice the consumers. There were so many Chinese there it speaking Mandarin it could have been China. It was tough not to just buy everything and anything, cos it all looked so good!

Using Lois as an excuse to photograph the strawberries. These are for Pei Yiing!

-went to Fashion Island after that. 200 stores and I only went to Forever 21 (cheaper than sg), Hollister and Wet Seal. The size of the shops was humongous and they were all having sales! I only got 2 shirts though, cos it was hard finding sizes or the designs were ugly.

A small part of Fashion Island at about 6pm.

-The guys came over and we started planning for our Grand Canyon trip only to realise that it's really far away and very expensive. So I suggested going to the San Diego Zoo instead. Yay! After we decided to check the STA travel out first, we continued playing Citadel. The Warlord must be used!

Citadel!

Sunday:

Went to Church with Prof Jeff and his wife Ruth, and their children Dina and Caleb. The sermon was really good, on 2 Chron 7:14 - "If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and heal their land." It was about how to to pray humbly, tenaciously and intently, and not to give up! I was pretty inspired by Pastor Rick's testimony of how when he was in college, he took a sheet of paper, stuck it on his wall and divided it into 4 columns:

1. Date requested
2. Item
   
3. Date answered
4. How it was answered

At the end of the term, he had 56 answered prayers, and everyone would go to his room just to check the list out. Inspired to do that now and for my hall room too.

Then we went to the Prof's house for lunch: British pot roast, potatoes and brussel sprouts. Totally rocked! Learnt that the kids play the guitar and bass and american football. At the end of the meal when their parents asked them to clean up, they were arguing and trying to pay each other to clean the kitchen and table. Haha. Sounds familiar.

While they were doing that, the Prof and his wife brought us to the beach so we could see it without the fog. The thing about the weather is that although it's sunny, it isn't humid and scorching hot, and the wind is cool. To quote Sean: it's like having aircon outside. Loved it. Could have stayed there all day with the sun out. Apparently, it's gonna turn cold again :(:(:(

My favourite photo of the sun and the water.

So that was my weekend.

...and burnt the pot.

View of the neighbour's house from the balcony.

Failed attempt to make steamed egg. Added too much water. Maybe the pot wasn't suitable. But the bottom is totally burnt and not shiny anymore. Sobs. I still ate the unburnt part though. Not bad, nicer if it wasn't contaminated by the burnt taste. Attempt to fry egg ended in disaster when the oil burst into flame. I don't know how to use this stove! The heat comes from a coil that's heated, so it's a bit like hot plate. Don't like.

My rice is niceeeee though!

The things people do when they don't have school. Have a Christian Students meeting and my father's coming later!