Hello Again

It's weeks like these that make me wish I were independently wealthy. I think, "How fun would it be to NOT work?" In reality, I know I need to be challenged somewhat. I mean, as much as I talk about completely useless, brain rotting shows like "America's Next Top Model" and follow the latest celebrity gossip, deep down, I know that I would go insane if that's all I ever got out of life. But there's a happy medium with workload, and this week's work far exceeded it.

I feel sad when I can't contribute more to the blog. I love Jen's posts. But I really want to have the time to write something of my own too. I thought about posting something earlier this week with just the title, "I'm sorry," and a picture of a kid hanging his head, covering his face in shame. But even that takes time, which I, unfortunately, didn't have this week.

Now I am here on a Friday night, unwinding from a long and stressful week of trying to meet my Friday deadline. Every night this week, I sent out a work-related message and document late from home. Every night, even if I took a break for a few hours, I stayed plugged in until my head hit the pillow. As one of my favorite characters of all time, Carrie Bradshaw would say, "Me no likey."

Nope. What I would like right now is a whole heap of money and nothing to do.

Cheers.

Now Presenting....Your Bread

With the always present health tip that eating less carbs will help a person lose weight, it's a wonder that most restaurants are still serving bread baskets prior to your meal. I try to avoid the bread whenever possible but there are some places and some moments when you just gotta have them. And then there are those times when you may be starving for some bread to hold you over until you get your main course and once you get it, you're just like 'Nah - forget it.' What is that? Cause I think it's all in the presentation.

In my eating-out experience, the following places have really great bread presentation:
Capitol Grill has a variety of breads in their bread basket including matzah...who serves matzah when it's not a Jewish holiday?
The brown bread, that also comes in a white version, from the Cheesecake Factory is so good - especially when they bring it out nice and warm. I eat the brown only - it's supposed to be healthier.
Individual dinner rolls from Legal Seafoods are also enticing - especially when you can see the steam coming off of it as you break it open.
The variety that you get, from Coastal Flats, is also very interesting. I'm a big fan of raisin bread while my husband is a fan of their "munchkin" looking breads.

Those are just a few of the places where you will most likely find me eating some bread prior to dinner - but the reasons why vary - it could be because I'm really hungry. It could be because I need something filling because I know my dinner isn't going to do the trick. It could just be because it looks nice.
What those places, listed above, have in common is that they have a nice presentation. The worst of the presentation probably comes from Legal Seafoods because it's just your dinner roll on a plate with a fish painted on it. But it's piping hot! As for the others, they will usually come out in a basket (wire and wicker) under a dinner napkin or on like a parchment paper. But it's all pretty inviting. When you get that basket with the dinner napkin covering your rolls, you just wanna say, "Hey - what's under there? Let's have a peek and a taste."

Recently, my husband and I made a trip to the California Pizza Kitchen. I always get an individual pizza and the occassional hummus as an appetizer. But it never ceases to amaze me that the pre-meal bread coming from the kitchen looks like prison food. Back in the old days when they said prison food was usually bread and water, this is exactly what I picture. A couple of slices from an ordinary looking bread, on top of an old, white plate, and a couple of packets of butter. I've also seen where the bread comes from. It's not freshly cut, from a loaf that just got baked out of their pizza oven - oh no. It's out of a utility-size, plastic container that looks like it should be holding your arts and crafts supplies rather than bread. I don't know why - I just can't help but think of prison when I get the CPK bread and that just makes me not want to eat or touch it. I wonder why they wouldn't make up a nice bread basket from their pizza dough or something - wouldn't that be much more in line with their regular offerings? Could they be using reverse psychology that if they don't present their bread well, they are helping me by not making me eat it before my pizza? That would be clever, but I highly doubt it.

Anyway - I think as well as in life, the same can be said for food - it's all in the presentation. If it looks good, there's a better chance I'll want to eat it. If you don't look so good, there's a fat chance you won't get touched.

Hugs, Not Slugs (or Drugs)

I know there are a lot of people out there that are big into hugs. In fact, it seems customary for some cultures to give hugs and cheek kisses upon greetings and departures - that is, daily greetings and departures.

I have to say, I was never a big hug person. I cherish my personal space and don't really appreciate people impeding on that space. But the same doesn't hold true for my husband...I love getting hugs from him. It's like every romance novel cliche with him - I feel safe and warm when I'm in his embrace (gag, here). I also love hugging my nephews probably because they're still small and I can get away with hugging them all the time - unlike when they get to the age where hugging can be embarrassing. There are certain friends I don't mind hugging - I find I'm hugging more friends nowadays than I ever did in my life. I hug my friends after a good night out (in thanks), upon not seeing them for awhile (cause I've missed them) or after spending a good amount of time with them (closing the chapter on our time together and who knows when we'll get to do this again). But there are definitely a lot more hugs when alcohol is consumed...then I'm not so picky about my personal space being invaded. (Odd.)

You have your serial huggers - these people hug, touch, grope - whatever. To them, personal space is not sacred...and they like to touch or hug you anytime and every time. Sometimes with these people, I get a little overloaded on their hugs and eventually might not even look forward to seeing them because of the eventual hug that will occur - is that bad? And these people are sober - I admit that I become somewhat of a serial hugger when I drink - it's liquid courage - it helps me put my guard down.

And then you just have people that are just downright not huggers. Yes, I was one of these people but it's grown on me - I think it depends on the hugger or the huggee - but you have people that just plain avoid it. They are the 'don't even try and touch me' non-huggers. And when you're "lucky" enough to capture them into one of your hugs, it can both look and feel awkward.

I had one such incident happen recently where I was greeting a couple that I knew by acquaintance. I certainly didn't know them as well as I know other people but they were invited over to my house because I was hosting a party. When the couple came into the house, the male opened his arms and gave me a hug. Okay - I'm feeling this - it's the holidays - I can dig it. Then I turned to his wife and expected the same - I went in for a hug with her that eventually turned out to be an awkward, half hug and maybe a weird pat on the back. I found out a couple of days later that the wife - not a hugger. Had I known that, I wouldn't have went in for it. I would've stopped with her husband...gladly. I guess I just didn't want her to feel left out in the mayhem of holiday hugginess.

Oh well - what's done is done and now I know - she is not a hugger. So noted.

You say, "Po-tae-toe"

Being multi-lingual, sometimes it's hard for me to comprehend certain things with pronunciation or really come up with the word I really want but can't think of in that given moment. I think, 'I know what I want to say, in Chinese, but in English, I draw a complete blank.' For me, it can get hard to think in different languages. But with pronunciation, I often find that I pronounce something totally different than say, oh, the general public.

There are some words that I just won't budge on - and I found it happened quite a bit in London! Prime example - Leicester Square. To me, that says 'lie-ses-ter' Square. Of course, on my first visit, I thought I saw a lot more letters - like Leicestershire - in which case I kept calling it 'Lie-shes-ter-ser' . Almost like worcestershire (or worcester) sauce - comfortably pronounced by me as 'wor-shes-ter' sauce. Regardless, some people knew what I was talking about, some didn't. Those who didn't, I'd just kindly refer to it as the 'gay-borhood.' Ahhh - that got them. Amanda was kind enough to inform me that it's actually pronounced 'Lester' Square. What? Are you kidding me? Les-ter - two syllables. (Lester = Dad in '227') There are clearly more than three syllables in Leicester. I filed the correct pronunciation away in my head, but continued on with my four syllable warble of the name. Afterall, worcester sauce is not 'wester,' is it?

Another simple word that set me apart from the native British was 'Bath' as in the town of Bath. With the ever elegant British pronunciation, the 'a' in Bath is a short 'a' and the initial pronunciation of 'Bath' sounds like a sheep's 'Baaaaah' - so it's 'Baaah-th.' Good old American me pronounces it like saying bathroom - my pronunciation in comparison to a British pronunciation makes me sound like Lina Lamont in 'Singin' in the Rain.' But I can't help myself.

It's a learning experience, for sure - but I think I've been doing okay so far. I'll just keep on keeping on and wait til someone corrects me.

Count on Hallmark for the Warm Fuzzies

One weekend of Christmas shopping down and I am in good shape. I had my trusty list with me of things I needed to buy and I have to say that I am about 85% complete with my Christmas shopping. The store that kicked it all off for me - Hallmark.

I have long discounted Hallmark as a gift giving place because they have a lot of little knick knacks and cute things that I'm just not in the market for. It wasn't until I received their catalog in the mail last week that I started looking through it and thinking, 'That would be really cute.' So I was sucked into the ads and walked into my local Hallmark Saturday morning with a firm list in hand and came out with four additional items - but finally making a dent into the Christmas list for the nephews.

Hallmark always gives me the warm fuzzies - it's really a shame I don't need to go in there more often....but I guess that's why they have the Hallmark Channel. By day, they bring you such feel good programming like 'Little House on the Prairie' and by night, you get made for TV movies that really tug at your heart strings. I actually contemplated spending a whole day watching nothing but the Hallmark channel just to see what would happen to me....would I feel any better about myself, would I start to cry during all their movies? But we know it's impossible for me to sit in front of the TV for a whole day just watching the Hallmark channel - besides the issue of finding the time, I'm a notorious channel surfer - so that wouldn't work.

But before going to bed last night, I did switch on the old TV and surfed to see what I could find at 10PM at night. I was actually hoping to find 'The Year Without a Santa Claus' (AWESOME movie with some great tunes) on ABC Family since they do a lot of their holiday programming at night - but instead, I found 'The Christmas Card' on the Hallmark Channel. Not exactly the clay-mation I was looking for but it still sparked my interest because you had a good looking guy (that's always worth a pause in channel surfing), a good looking lady, a love story and Ed Asner.

I only watched 30 minutes of the movie but I believe I can tell you exactly what the plot is, what happens and the flaws I found. Basically, Cody (good looking guy) is a soldier in the war in Afghanistan (movie was filmed in 2006). He receives a card from Faith (good looking lady) during the war. She comes from a small town in California where her parents (Dad = Ed Asner) owns a mill that she helps run. This card has so touched Cody that he vows that he's going to make it through the war and find this woman that has gotten him through the war. He goes to her small town and is pleasantly surprised, I'm sure, that she's a tall, good looking blonde. Cody also befriends her parents and ends up taking a job at their mill. So Cody and Faith get to know each other and you can tell that there's an instant attraction. (sidenote: Cody, played by John Newton, is really good looking) There's just one problem..Faith has a boyfriend whom she also becomes engaged to one hour into the movie. So Cody must accept this, even though they shared a kiss in the woods that he doesn't regret, and decides he must move on and move out of the town (can't exactly stay in the town with the girl you fell in love with marrying someone else). Also - for some reason, he's living with Faith's parents....this is the disadvantage of catching a movie in progress because I'm not sure if he knows them from before the war or Ed Asner just took a liking to the boy and invited him to stay in their home.

Anyways - I didn't watch the last 15 minutes of the movie but I'm SURE, as Hallmark exists in your local mall, that Cody and Faith get together. You know why - because Faith's fiancee is a GEEK! In the 30 minutes I watched, I only saw him for about five minutes and let me tell you - he was ALL wrong for her. Faith is very close with her family and works at the mill. Her fiancee was ready to whisk her off to the city and said they could come visit but not only was she not aware of these plans (communication issues?), she was not prepared to move away. Also - with a side by side looks comparison between Cody and the fiancee, there was just no comparison needed - Cody won hands down...the man was an Adonis in comparison. So that was my major issue with this movie...if I were Faith, I wouldn't have had an issue choosing between my geeky boyfriend or Cody - Cody was sweet, humble and it didn't hurt that he was good looking. Boyfriend was controlling, condescending and not good looking. I was not sympathetic towards the boyfriend at all. In fact, I got angry with Faith for having such a hard time with her mixed feelings. After all, her parents LOVED Cody and were visibly and admittedly "in mourning" when Faith accepted boyfriend's proposal over Cody. What couldn't Faith see that her parents and I saw immediately?!

The other thing I had an issue with - albeit only a minor issue - was Ed Asner having a sleigh to ride around in. For those of you in the know, Ed Asner played Santa Claus in Will Ferrell's wildly popular holiday movie, "Elf." In that, he had a pimped out, flying sleigh drawn by eight reindeer. In this movie, where he was a regular, old mill-owner, civilian, he had a one-horse drawn sleigh - the sleigh was still pimped out with two benches that could hold up to six people (poor horse) and brake lights - because saying 'Whoa Nellie' to the horse is not obvious enough that you've stopped. So I'm wondering - does he have it written into his contracts that a sleigh has to be in the movie? Like pop stars and rock bands with their pre-concert demand lists - Ed Asner has a sleigh written into his contract.....hmmmm.

In conclusion, although Hallmark does give me the warm fuzzies, we need to seriously re-think some of these 'made for TV movie' plots - make them more believable. Did the story ultimately tug at my heartstrings and make me yearn for a love story like Alice and Cody? No.