Happy Birthday to Me

Saw Alice in Wonderland and then went to BJ's. Not a bad day! :)

Today's Brunch

Hi, I'll have the gravy skillet.

On Vacation Mode

This, my friends, is a Long Island. (With a glass of water, of course. I'm not here to get blitzed or anything.) I arrived at Sea-Tac a couple of hours ago and have settled in lovely Bellevue, where I will spend the next few days doing a lot of hanging out and hopefully going to Seattle to check out some things. Right now I'm at The Cheesecake Factory waiting for my dinner to arrive. This trip has started off well. :)

Happy Birthday to Me

If my birthday falls on a work day, I generally schedule that day off...that way I know I'll be in at least a decent mood. :) Today I went out to lunch at a local sushi place, and at the end of the meal these oranges came along. I took this picture because I was amused by the way the oranges looked after we ate the orange sections within. They kind of reminded me of googly eyes.

Semper Fidelis

There may have been another word on that cake, but I was late to the party. One of my cousins is heading off to join the Marines. The family has mixed feelings about this, but this is really what he wants to do, so we'll support him.

Colorful Candy

These are chocolate-covered sunflower seeds. I never thought of covering those with chocolate, but hey, they're good. Good and colorful. My co-worker got these when she went on vacation, back east or Canada or somewhere? I wonder where she got them.

Organic Cookie

This isn't a very clear picture, and I unfortunately didn't come back to comment on this immediately (I'm writing this on the 23rd), so I don't quite remember what I wanted to write here...maybe just something about how "organic" was a part of all but three of the ingredient names (water, baking soda and sea salt). That and I must have been crazy to spend $1.79 on a cookie. I'm not rich, people.

Another Japanese Snack Review

This time we're looking at "kinoko no yama", which means "mountain of mushrooms" or "mushroom mountain" or however you'd like to phrase it. This snack is similar to Pocky, except that it's a much shorter stick with a thick section of chocolate shaped like a mushroom cap. Comes in a bunch of flavors, too, so if you like Pocky, you'd like these. They're very cute. One of my friends said they'd be good to have on a cake, and I'd definitely agree with that.

Japanese Snack Review

This is a snack food called "Kaaru" (which they've romanized as "Karl", but I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be "Curl"...would anyone like to verify this?). They're these lovely curly corn puff things. I've had them before; however, I only came across the ume-wasabi flavor a couple of weeks ago. (Oh yeah, "ume" means "plum".) Never having seen these flavors combined before, I naturally had to try this. It's interesting...the aroma of plum hits you upon opening the bag. I tasted the wasabi more than the plum when I actually ate some of them, though my friend noticed a plum aftertaste. They seem appropriate for spring somehow...that's just the feeling I get from them. If you're brave enough to try them, I suggest you do.

Images of Christmas, Part II

Every year, my grandmother buys this type of cake and has "Happy Birthday Jesus" written on it. We also sing Happy Birthday to Jesus. This picture serves as proof that I'm not making this up.