I am so tired I could close my eyes and go to sleep right now. I’ve been that way all day and I got up at 11:00!

This past week was a little crazy and I thought I would be able to catch up on my sleep and TiVoed stuff this weekend but that never happened.

Susan had invited me for a party at John’s house. So Friday night, Wendy picked me up and we headed over to the party. There weren’t too many people but we actually had a lot of fun. We were there until almost 3:00 am so I didn’t go to bed until 4:00.

Yesterday just flew by; I honestly have no idea what I did all day. Then Fariba came by to pick me up so we could go to Tom and Arthur’s party in San Francisco. It was pretty nice and their house was packed. There were probably about 10 girls and 60+ gay guys. And they were all so hot! Why is that?

We left the party around 1:00 and drove around the city checking out some of my old hangout places. It was very depressing, they all sucked. One of them used to be packed with cool people and last night they were closing at 1:15 because it was so dead. There were also cop cars all over San Francisco. When did it become like that?

We finally gave up and drove back. I didn’t fall asleep until 4:00 am again. I guess that would explain why I fell like a zombie today and why I’m still not over my cold.

This week will be insane again since I have to start packing and get everything ready for my trip. 10 days left!

Pure Brazil

Planet Rhythm 2004, Audio CD, $15.98

I can’t believe Tuna already left. Time just flew! It was great to see her again and I hope she enjoyed her trip.

Thursday, I left early to pick up Tuna from the airport and we then headed back to downtown Mountain View. We checked out our pub but it was a little dead so we ended up at F&A. It was 18 & over night so I felt like a grandma! We had both skipped dinner so we stopped by Denny’s before heading home. It’s amazing how there aren’t that many 24 hr restaurants or diners around here.

Friday, I worked from home for most of the day and then Tuna and I went shopping for the party. There were some older guys at Andronico’s who looked like they were there to pick up chicks. Very weird. The party was nice although several people couldn’t make it. I think some were afraid of driving over the Bay Bridge. Tuna became an expert at making Caipirinhas and people were drinking them as though they were lemonades.

Saturday we spent most of the day at the Stanford Mall but we didn’t buy too much stuff. We then met Su at Niebaum-Coppola for dinner. The food was great as usual. We then headed to Café Borrone to get some coffee but Su was a little freaked out by the men at the table next to us. We ended up at the pub again and made the bouncer happy since he’s totally in love with Tuna. She was very popular with the men there, especially the very short ones. Some of the people dancing were hilarious. Hopefully TT will write more about it since she took copious notes (our coasters had a “Notes:” section on the back).

Today, we woke up pretty early and I drove Tuna to the airport (after the obligatory stop at Jamba Juice). She made it back safely to Rochester and I already miss having her around. I hope Tuna and Chuck can come to Brazil in December.

I met up with Su and Nathan yesterday to look at a 5 bedroom house in Palo Alto. The house looks great from the outside but it was really old inside and it was already furnished. The owners don’t want to remove the furniture so they’re having a hard time renting it. Their furniture is horrible!

We ended up at Cafe Borrone in Menlo Park, one of my favorite places since Su first took me there when I moved down here. There’s a great bookstore next door that stays open until midnight or something. We got a Portuguese phrasebook so Nathan and Su can start practicing for our trip to Brazil at the end of the year.

Brazilian Portuguese

Marcia Monje de Castro. Lonely Planet Publications 2003, Paperback, 256 pages, $7.99

Birthday
Friday was great! Su and Nathan picked me up and we met Heidi and Chad at the Coppola Cafe. The place is very cool and the food was awesome. I also got some great gifts! After dinner, Su, Nathan, and I went to Los Gatos and then to San Jose but we couldn’t find any places that we liked. We ended up back here in Mountain View at our usual pub. Oh, we then had to stop by Happy Donuts since Nathan was hungry.

Let’s see… I got back from Boston Thursday night. The conference was ok, half of the talks were very useful and the other half was crap. Pretty typical for conferences. I did meet some great people from the Bay Area so that made it much better. We went out every night and got to try out some great restaurants and bars. We hung out in Harvard Square for the most part. On Wednesday night, Smitty took us to the Italian neighborhood in Boston. It looked surreal, almost like a movie set. I could almost see myself moving to Boston just so I could hang out at the North End.

Here’s a guide to the places we tried:

Casablanca Restaurant
The food was delicious, one of the best meals we had in Cambridge. The bar was also nice.

Legal Sea foods
This was just around the corner from the hotel. I’m a vegetarian so I had the greek salad both time we ate there. It was ok. They had this awesome onion strings thing which was delicious.

Fire & Ice
They call themselves an “improvisational grill”. You pick out the ingredients and they stir fry it. They had caipirinhas so that alone made it a great place.

Mamma Maria
This was a bit expensive but the food was simply amazing and you can’t beat the view from the upstairs window.

Caffe Vittoria
We went there for dessert and everything was so yummy it was hard to pick just one.

Wonder Bar
Live jazz and a menu with mostly cheese dishes. You can’t beat that!

John Harvard’s Brew House
Our hangout of choice at Harvard Square.

Shay’s
Total dive. My kind of place. =)

There were a couple other bars but I can’t remember what they were called.

airplanes
Flying wasn’t scary at all. I was actually pretty surprised at how unafraid I was. On our flight to Boston, we spotted the air marshal right away. He was this studly looking guy and all the flight attendants were openly flirting with the guy. They would start giggling as soon as they walked into a ten feet radius of the guy. His gun was pretty visible too. I guess that’s good since it helps the bad guys figure out whom to take out first and where they can find a gun.

back to reality
Since I’ve been back, I’ve been feeling a little blah. It’s difficult to come back to real life after you spend a whole week going out every night and meeting all kinds of new people. Today, Su, Nathan and I went to see Serendipity. It was cute in a predictable-and-overtly-romantic-chick-flick sort of way.

Serendipity

John DeBorman (Cinematographer). Miramax Home Entertainment 2001, DVD, $14.99

Last night was good. Heidi joined us and she even liked the place. First we had dinner at Amicis. Su hated the waiter. The poor kid couldn’t have been more than 16 years old. Then we headed to our new pub hangout (according to Su who is the official selector of hangout places). It was ok, there were lots of very old men there at first.

Then this guy came over and handed Su a fairly large bouquet of flowers. The guy was icky and he was obviously infatuated with Su. Fifteen minutes later, the waitress tells us that the guy with glasses (Su’s guy) wants to buy us drinks. Heidi and I already had drinks so Su ordered another Cosmo and debated on what the protocol was for thanking the guy. The cute Irish bartender didn’t seem to think that she had to go talk to him. Five minutes later the waitress comes over and asks Su if she’s going to go thank the guy. Unbelievable! I think, in the end, he came over to talk to her again. Before we left, he gave her his phone number(s), email address and wrote something cheesy like “Keep smiling”.

I forgot to mention, yesterday I was officially promoted to UI Design Manager. It was pretty exciting although I have been doing the manager job for over 6 months now; I just didn’t have the title.

Today, Su came by after work and we went to the mall together. It was nice; I hadn’t gone shopping with a friend since I moved to California. I got some makeup and a pair of pants. Su bought some nice shoes. We then came back to MV and had Indian food. The food was great but I ate way too much.

Girls’ night out was great. Su had several Cosmos (okay, she only had 3) and we wrote postcards to send to our remote friends (including Heidi who isn’t so remote but we thought that would convince her to join us next time).

Saturday was Nathan’s b-day party (more like a partylet) at my house. Su came over around noon with 6 bags of food from Whole Foods. Then we started worrying that there weren’t enough meat items for the men so we went and got some more food. In the end we had way too much food but at least there was something for everyone. We then went to get some coffee in downtown Mountain View. We were sitting outside and there was a crazy woman talking to us about crazy stuff.

Heidi and Chad were the first to show up. They brought me flowers (Su did too so my house is looking great now). Nathan and Eric arrived a bit later. Tyson (Nathan’s brother) and Kim (his gf) were also there. We played Cranium and the girls won (again).

I’m still confused. So what’s the difference between a curly fry and a butterfly fry? Is the butterfly fry a flatter curly fry?

I wish there were strangers linking to my blog. But I don’t think there are. My life is just not interesting enough lately.

Woke up and there was no water again. Cleaning lady came but couldn’t clean. She acted as an interpreter and talked to the plumber. He wouldn’t be done until 5:00 pm (and would continue this week). Cleaning lady left and rescheduled for Saturday at 8:30 am. Argh!

Called Su and we decided to meet for lunch. Picked up Su and went to Mandarin Gourmet.

We drove around Palo Alto looking at houses. Some construction workers let us check out some places that were being restored. They sucked.

Came back home but felt antsy with no running water available.

Drove to downtown Mountain View and checked out some apartments. Hung out at Starbucks until 5 pm.

I was watching The House of Mirth when Su called. It was Nathan’s b-day and they wanted to go for dessert and drinks.

The House of Mirth

Remi Adefarasin (Cinematographer). Sony Pictures 2000, DVD, $14.94

We had desserts at Il Fornaio. Su wants that to be our hang out place now. Headed to F&A. It was full of Europeans. We couldn’t figure out why. Then we tried British Banker’s and that sucked. Finally we went to Blue Chalk but it was pretty dead.

On our way to my house, we decided to go to Denny’s. The guys in the booth behind us looked like they had played Dungeons & Dragons. I mentioned that. Two seconds later we hear them start talking about wizards, ogres and trolls.

Fed Heidi’s cats in the morning.

Went shopping near Heidi’s house.

Saw a spider at Macys jewelry department. Saleswoman freaked out: “Our jewelry comes from overseas. The spider could be poisonous”. Saleswoman was clearly from overseas herself.

Headed to Los Gatos for a barbecue at Nathan’s. Thermometer in my car went from 93 to 103 as I approached Los Gatos.

Nathan’s barbecue was great. There was tons of food. We played Cranium. The girls beat the guys. We ate pop rock Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. It didn’t work as well as plain pop rocks.

I came home around 6 pm and rented four movies: Anti-trust (horrible), Don’t Drink the Water (typical Woody Allen), The Wedding Planner (cheesy but worth it for Matthew M.), and The House of Mirth (very good though it looked like Gillian Anderson was about to cry the whole time).

Cranium

Cranium, Toy, $24.99

Antitrust

Phillippe, Ryan (Primary Contributor). MGM (Video & DVD) 2001, DVD, $14.95

Don’t Drink the Water

Julie Kavner (Primary Contributor). Walt Disney Video 1994, DVD, $9.99

The Wedding Planner

Julio Macat (Cinematographer). Sony Pictures 2001, DVD, $14.94

The House of Mirth

Remi Adefarasin (Cinematographer). Sony Pictures 2000, DVD, $14.94

I talked to Tuna on Friday and she told me that kettle korn is mainly available at festivals. I’m not a big festival person. A few hours later I talked to Heidi and they were going to the Foster City Fair. So I seized the opportunity and now I’ll be able to try kettle korn! Maybe I’ll have I tomorrow as I’m watching usability tests.

Tuna also said that she and Chuck might come to Brazil at the end of the year when I go to visit my family. That would be awesome. I talked to my mom and she is really excited too.

My dad called me from Spain yesterday. He’s doing this crazy pilgrimage thing to Santiago de Compostela. He has covered about 50 miles so far and is already completely exhausted. He still has about 100 miles to go and only 6 days left. I hope he has a good week and I can’t wait until he is home.