Stupid American TV stolen from Japanese TV. Still funny.

Followed by typical Japanese TV. I may just populate my blog solely with clips of Japanese TV shows.


water bottle rocket
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tiny piano duet
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We had a discussion in class (Operations I think) on square watermelons. Well now the Japanese have star shaped cucumbers. It also costs about 5x a normal cucumber and all they do is grow the cucumber in a mold. I'm inventing a pyramid shaped melon and calling it Tutankha-melon©. I am just full of good ideas lately. 

The sights and sounds of LA

The ghetto bird (aka police helicopter) has been circling above our townhouse for the last 3 hours trying to track down a fugitive. Suffice to say, you won't take me alive dirty coppers!!

The Valley isn't THAT bad. This is only the second fugitive manhunt that's happened within a 2 block radius of me and I've only seen the cops draw their guns on people once. All this over a 6 week period. I think I can deal with 1 police incident every 3 weeks. 

I grew up on the mean streets of the 90275 area code, which is only about 40 miles southwest of South Central LA, so  I feel I got some street cred.

*Update* Finally, the chopper is gone. Knowing the LAPD they probably shot the dude in the back and then claimed that he had a bazooka in his pocket or something.

Anyways, the SO is on a business trip to Charlotte, NC to visit corporate headquarters so this post is free of feminine interjection.

The past weekend was the typical whirlwind day. Friday, the SO and I took her colleague from India to see LA tourist attractions, Saturday was our visit to a production company to audition bands for our wedding and Sunday was Tylenol day as I tried to recover from my Deloitte friends' kick-ass wedding that I attended. I use Deloitte friends' and not friend's because they met while working at Deloitte. I actually met the SO while working there too. Deloitte....crushing social lives and enriching love lives all in one green Dot.

Too many words and not enough pictures? The lady doth protest too much, me thinks. 

Maybe I'm biased but LA has some crap tourist attractions. I mean one of our main tourist attractions is a bunch of metal stars embedded into sidewalks and some arts and crafts done by "actors". I'll explain the "actors" comment in a bit.

 Thus, given our choices of tourist attractions, we headed first to Griffith Observatory. The observatory just opened last year after an extensive renovation project.

The best part about the observatory is the view of LA. Don't mind the smog it's just there to add ambiance and cancer.

After a quick stroll through the observatory and it's exhibitions we headed to the main event.

Graumman's Chinese Theatre is probably better known for the arts and crafts prominently displayed outside it's main entrance. The  illustrious list of actors and actresses with their hand and footprints forever memorialized in cement is long. From stars of the golden age of silent movies to today's A-list actors it's a who's who of Hollywood. 

John Wayne. 

The Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger. Wow my auto correct recognizes Schwarzenegger. Google folks must be Kindergarten Cop fans. The Governator has surprisingly small feet. I wear size 9s and they were more or less perfectly snug in those indentations. Can you tell my shoes were 29 dollars? Yeah, I can too. 

Mel Gibson. Those hands just look like they're made for beatings and antisemitism.   

Like I said earlier the list of stars is long and illustrious....

Steven Seagal!?!?!? How the hell? And why is that man wearing white socks with his dress shoes and shorts. I'm so confused. Maybe Seagal just attracts bad taste.

Steven Seagal's last 10 movies according to IMBD.com

1. Machete
2. Born to Raise Hell
3. A Dangerous Man
4. The Keeper
5. Driven to Kill
6. Against the Dark
7. Kill Switch
8. The Onion Movie - credited as "Cock Puncher"
9. Pistol Whipped
10. Urban Justice. 

A man with this resume is alongside Clark Gable, Shirley Temple, Denzel Washington, etc. Good choice there. Sorry to keep ranting about this but Seagal had a lucky streak of movies in the 80s and 90s but in no way shape or form should he have  been considered for such an honor. These are his "hits"

1. Hard to Kill
2. Marked for Death
3. Out for Justice
4. Under Siege
5. On Deadly Ground
6. Under Siege 2
7. Executive Decision - he's only in the movie 10 minutes
8. The Glimmer Man
9. Fire Down Below

HE PLAYS THE SAME CHARACTER IN EACH MOVIE. ANGRY WHITE MAN WHO KNOWS AIKIDO. The formula for a Seagal movie....

Choose Setting A
Forest where a fire is raging
A carrier ship
A train
Mean streets of metropolitan city X

Choose Occupation B
Military special forces
Cop
Firefighter
Angry Citizen

Choose Emotion C
Angry
Brooding anger
Quiet anger mixed with revenge fantasy

A+B+C+?????= Profit

I don't get it and I just spent twenty minutes ranting about Steven Seagal. I don't know if I've won or lost at life on that one.

After a quick game of stare down with Samuel L. Jackson it was time to walk along Hollywood Boulevard to check out the stars.

RIP MJ.

I took some pictures of other stars but really, need I show more?

For those men out there stuck in the rat race of the corporate world

Budget Plannerfrom Mint.com

I need what this guy is on

I'm like a cow

Like the cow, sheep, goat, pig and guinea pig I've been domesticated. A part of me bristles at the thought of another trip to Costco, fighting off the hordes of families and their rabid offspring but another part of me smiles at the thought of spending idyllic Sundays going shopping with the family and eating a nice Sunday dinner. 

It's partly nostalgia that makes me look forward to that. My dad traveled a lot for work. Hell, he still is away 3/4 of the month but we always managed to have Sunday dinners together and I really enjoyed those times when it was me, my mom and dad sitting down, laughing it up as my mom made fun of my dad about something and my dad half heartedly defending himself. 

I don't know where I'm going with this post. It's a meandering path through my brain. For those who just want to see pictures....

I got this lighter at Honey Pig in Ktown. Not only does it shoot flames out of its nostrils, it does so out of both nostrils so you get two epic pig flames lighting up the night sky. 

On Saturday I went to this bar in West Hollywood called The Surly Goat. They have approximately 30 beers on tap from across the globe AND 

a stuffed goat. That goat just looks surly. 

Anyways, I don't know where I was going with that post but in any case, lately I've been thinking a lot about the future and my aspirations. Actually, it's more about how to reconcile my goals and aspirations. On one hand I want to be travelling the world, doing business in multiple time zones and expanding upon the international experience I had at ESADE. On the other hand, I know I want a family and some semblance of normalcy for my family. That means not being away for weeks at a time and having time for the family too. I know how hard it is for everyone when one parent is always away. Then again this is kinda at odds with some of my career goals. 

I'm gonna be 30 this year. I know I'm f'n old. Yet, I still haven't quite figured out everything. Pieces are falling together but I'm missing big chunks of the total picture. They say part of growing up is figuring out these important things in life but I haven't figured yet. I don't know if I ever will. But maybe that's the point of life. It's the constant search, adjustment and realization of your dreams and goals. Life is a journey and not a desti.....

'Sup.

Independence Day

Burgers and July 4th go together like Spain and inefficiency so for our July 4th BBQ at the SO's sister's bf's house we decided to make some blue cheese burgers. The house and the bf do exist. It's not like those stories you  were told by a friend who swears it was true because he heard it from his sister's aunt's cousin's hairdresser's brother in law who was there when it happened.

The blue cheese being cut up for the burger patties. Apparently the trick is to put the slice of cheese in the middle of the patty instead of mixing it all in the ground beef. Mmmm....cheesy. 

We're all packed up and ready to go. We're being eco-friendly by using our reusable bags. The eco-friendliness was offset by the methane released from my lactose intolerant body. Yes, I've resorted to fart jokes now. 

You thought we would just have burgers? Of course not. We had burgers, salad, desert, beer and vodka to bring to the party. This would be complemented by ribs, chicken, chips and salsa, corn and lobster tails. Enough to feed a party of 12. Good thing there were only six of us there. 

The sister's bf gives me something to pursue while I struggle to finish my MBA. If I don't enjoy professional success there's always organ donation. I hear kidneys go for a pretty penny in certain parts of the world. Who needs two functioning kidneys when when you have a Porsche in your garage. 

The burgers grilling. 

Grillmaster and straw hat wearer extraordinaire. 

Ready to enjoy the fruits of our labor. Unfortunately there are no more pictures after this because I fell into a food induced coma that I would not wake up from for about three days. Beef, it does a body good. 

Wining, Dining and BBQing Part 1

This weekend we celebrated the independence of America from the clutches of the evil British empire. No taxation without representation damn redcoats.

July 4th is an American institution. If you're American and you don't like July 4th that's because you're A) Benedict Arnold, you hate hot dogs, burgers or beer, you don't like fireworks, you're Canadian/British or you don't believe in freedom. USA USA USA!!!

The celebration of Independence Day is supposed to be a celebration of America. Or as the SO has been saying it 'Merica. She hasn't started watching NASCAR or drinking Bud Light just yet but I think she's on her way. Anyways, like with any celebratory public holiday there's tons of drinking and eating but for the SO and I this is no different than any other weekend. The difference this time was that we had 3 days to gorge and binge and we got to justify everything by saying "It's July 4th and that extra burger, beer, chip, brownie, cake, cocktail, etc. is because we're celebrating America and not because we're insatiable eating machines."

Alright, I know, too much blah blah blah. You're not here for the words you're here for the pictures.

Before I got to Spain I started watching this rotund Spanish man Jose Andres do a 30 minute cooking show called Made in Spain. I loved it because it got me excited about Spain and made Spanish food look good. Little did I know that Barcelona cuisine would fall miserably short of the expectations built up thanks to Jose. I later learned that he was owner/chef of 5 restaurants in the D.C. Metro area and was renowned for his take on molecular gastronomy. What is molecular gastronomy you say? Wikipedia defines it as "a scientific discipline that studies the physical and chemical processes that occur while cooking. Molecular gastronomy seeks to investigate and explain the chemical reasons behind the transformation of ingredients, as well as the social, artistic and technical components of culinaryand gastronomic phenomena in general."Or as I like to call it, "how can we charge $12 for some pretty looking food".

So Jose Andres opened a restaurant in the SLS Hotel in Beverly Hills called The Bazaar. It's a modern take on Spanish tapas. Yes, I'm eating tapas in Los Angeles after living in Spain for a year. No, they did not have patatas bravas. Yes, I almost punched myself in the face when I thought about ordering the pan amb tomate.

My picture of the menu didn't come out very well so here's one from one of the gazillion food blogs. 

The dining room area. Once again taken from a food blog. My picture would've been just like this except filled with Kim Kardashian looking girls and their boyfriends and Michael Douglas looking older men with their trophy wives/escorts/mistresses/"friends". 

Bazaar has a water menu. Do you want the definition of pretentious? It's this...

Speyside-Glenlivet Still (750ml) - $10
Speyside is drawn from the 500 million year old Braes of Glenlivet rock formation, situated inside the Crown Estate of Glenlivet. At a total mineral content of 58 mg/liter, it is light, slightly alkaline and virtually sodium-free and nitrate-free.

or how about this...

Lauretana Still (750ml) - $10
Lauretana proclaims this is the most microbiologically pure, natural drinking water known to the world. Bottled in a unique 750 ml clear glass bottle designed by the famous Ferrari coach-maker Pininfarina

We started off with crab meat steamed buns. There's two of us and there are three steamed buns. Guess who ate the third.

Scallops Romanesco. They used a fair amount of rock salt on the sauce. I'd recommend not slathering it on unless you want to guzzle the rock mineral drip water.

The accompaniment to our dinner, a Priorat wine. I learned about wines from the Priorat region while I was dining with two friends in Barcelona and was glad to see that Bazaar had some on the menu. We got the cheapest one.

Cippolini onions topped with a slice of tangerine. Really liked this one. There's five onions on this one. I swear the chef is just messing with me.

Hanger steak. Delicious.

Bazaar's pièce de résistance, Cotton Candy Foie Gras. It was....let's say....interesting. I've never been a fan of foie gras but I had to try this one. The cotton candy envelops the foie gras but I didn't really see how the cotton candy enhanced the flavor. God, I sound like such a douche.

Japanese tacos. Eel wrapped in cucumber skin. Liked this dish. Maybe I'm biased. 

Avocado wrapped with jicama. Fresh and delicious but all I could taste was the guacamole. 

After we were done with our entrees we were escorted to the Patisserie for desserts. The desserts were all lined up for our viewing pleasure.

Nitro Coconut Floating Island. I don't even know how to describe this one so I'll just copy what I found in a food review, It's "a whimsical take on the French meringue pie". It wasn't that full of whim but it was delicious and light.

The man, the legend, the chef....Jose Andres. 

The hotel and restaurant was designed by Philippe Starke so they had some of his "art". 

The SO mesmerized by the bears and me trying not to worry too much about how much I just paid for that dinner. All in all a very good restaurant and definitely a place I'd recommend for special occasions, out of town guests and 2nd-3rd dates with your new lady/guy friend.

Part 2 of this post will come later after I've finished digesting. Might take a couple of days.