I've decided to give up all noodles for 2013. So that includes ramen, yakisoba, spaghetti and all other noodle-based pasta dishes, all forms of pancit, and all chinese noodle dishes. I'm really going to miss ramen, since that's my favorite, and because I have instant ramen & yakisoba for lunch all the time. I'll miss grandma's pancit palabok. I'll miss spaghetti since that's one thing that I can actually cook myself since it's kind of easy. But it shouldn't be too bad. I've done pizza, burgers, & sushi, so this should be no problem.

I've already started my farewell noodles tour. Kairakutei in Tustin (near Irvine, during the Kpop concert weekend), I Love Ramen & Noodles in Concord, and Norikonoko in Berkeley. Still need to hit up San Mateo. Santa Ramen for sure, maybe Ramen Dojo and Himawari.

Didn't camp out this year. There were really weren't any deals worth camping out for, since we had gotten our TVs last year. I mostly shopped online, and a bunch of stores had their deals available online earlier in the week.

I volunteered at Glide in SF to help prepare Thanksgiving meals for the needy. They had a big room set up for carving turkey and ham. There were a bunch of camera crews there shooting cutting away. I'm not sure if I made it it any of the footage they used, but I know I was in view of the cameras.

Reporter lady on the right.

A view from the other end of the room.

A full, bone-in ham. These suckers were heavy!

Outer skin removed, ready to slice & dice.

I went through 1 medium-sized turkey & 2 hams in the our 90 minute shift. Cutting for 90 minutes straight is no joke. My hand started to get fatigued after a while, so I had to switch up my grip (twss?). But it was worth it. The line for the meals had wrapped around the block so I couldn't see where it ended, kinda like a Black Friday line. It's nice to know that I could lend a hand in helping the hungry eat a decent meal for the holidays.

View from our seats in section 212 row K seats 11-12.

I went with Gabe. You'd think Shann the super Laker fan would've gone too, but for some reason he turned it down, even and I scored cheap(ish) tickets off Stubhub. Well, he missed out on a really good game...for the Kings. The Kings beat the Lakers, 113-97, despite Kobe scoring 38 points and getting every single ticky-tack superstar foul call. And there were hella Lakers fan, probably more than Kings fans. And all ended up leaving early since it was kind of a blowout halfway through the 4th quarter. Oh, and this is my first time watching the Kings win in at least 2 years. Extra bonus points for it being against the Lakers.

Batch 1 vs batch 2. Waaaaay smaller.

Experimented with shapes & layers.

This time, I made them way smaller, put more sugar on the top, and more sugar in the cream cheese filling. It tasted a lot closer to Porto's than my first batch. I used the cream cheese in the first batch, but with more sugar, so it was still more liquidy than I would've liked. I think it's because I used reduced fat cream cheese. Next time, I'll spring for the regular stuff. Other than that, I think I just have to bake them a little longer to get them more crisp on the outside. I'm getting close!

I took a crack at making something like Porto's cheese rolls. I looked up a recipe online, and it seemed simple enough. My first try didn't come out too bad, but it needs some tweaks.

I don't know what's up with my iPhone camera, but the cream cheese isn't really that yellow-ish, I guess it's just bad lighting. I had mixed the cream cheese filling ingredients a bit too much, so it was more liquidy than solid, so it came oozing out the sizes, and I couldn't properly seal the ends. And they were big & dense (they felt real heavy). Next time, I'll make them about half the size. As for the tweaks, I need to add more sugar to the cream cheese filling and more sugar on the outer crust.

Fun, as usual. Love this event.

We hit the motherload. There were 7 of us, and we grabbed a bunch of cases.

Frank "Big Hurt" Thomas and his new Big Hurt Beer. He didn't seem that tall in real life, but he was still big & buff and looked scary strong for a retired baseball player turned brewer.

My face is sore from smiling & laughing for about 2 hours straight. Totally worth it. And to think, this almost didn't happen, multiple times. Just another example of how things happen to work out for the best in the end.**

Had time to kill before the show, and I walked by city hall, and it looked nice, so I took a pic.

View from the nosebleed section. It was still cool, don't really need to see the comic perform. Louis CK doesn't do a lot of physical comedy.

We couldn't take any pics of the comics on-stage (there was 1 opening act), because the pre-show announcer, who also happened to be the opening act, comically warned everyone to not take any pics during the show, more or less promising public shame to anyone who did.

The show was amazing. The opening act, apparently Louis CK's best friend, was funny. And Louis CK brought his A-game, as expected. I don't remember the specifics of everything, but he bits about how putting on socks is the most difficult thing ever, how being 45 is the perfect age because you don't HAVE to do anything you're told, and then his "of course......but maybe" bit was hilarious. Kind of wrong, but still hella funny. I am really glad that I went to this show. It was soo totally worth it.

It did feel weird going by myself. Everyone else seemed to be with someone. And then waiting around before the show, by myself, was felt weird. But all that went away as soon as the show started.

** How it almost didn't happen
Louis CK did this thing where he bypassed ticket retailers & the box office and just sold the tickets himself directly on the website for 1 flat fee, no BS fees or anything. Every seat was the same price, $45. Tickets went on sale for the 4 SF shows some time in June. I wanted to go with Kev cause he's also a fan, so I sent him a link to get a ticket. I got my ticket, but he couldn't get his cause it sold out. Right then, I thought maybe I should just sell my ticket cause I don't want to go alone. But then I didn't cause I thought maybe he could get a ticket somehow later.

I got the 1st ticket that was available to buy, and it was for the 10pm show on the first night, Wednesday Nov 14. Great, in the middle of the week. I was planning on taking the following day off cause that drive back would've been insane (show ended at 12am, about 2 hour drive back to Sac). But I had to hope that I didn't have any important meetings scheduled for that Thursday, but it was tough to plan since I bought the ticket in June for the show in November. Well, November rolls through, and I had 2 meetings scheduled for that Thursday. Son of a B. So then I think, man I'm really shouldn't go to the show, cause I'd be back in Sac around 2am, and then be hella tired at my meetings. But I didn't sell my ticket, hoping things would work out.

Lucky me, things did happen to work out. Those 2 meetings ended up getting cancelled. So I used my monthly PLP (personal leave program) day off for that Thursday, which I also used a day to review for the promotional exam that I was scheduled to take the next day in Oakland, which I really needed. If I didn't review, I would've been sooo screwed for that exam. So it all worked out in the end.

**end story

4th concert this year, which I didn't even realize it until Jay asked. This time around, unlike all the other concerts, we settled for 2nd tier seating, aka non-VIP seats, because the VIP seats were way too expensive. Well, most of us ended up missing out because the VIP seats came with access to fan meets with the performing groups. VIP seats were guaranteed a spot in one of the fan meets, but there was also a raffle for non-VIP seats, so I entered all 6 of our seats. Lucky s.o.b. Shann got the Sistar fan meet, which also in the same tent as 4minute. Me & Chris got the boy band CNBlue. W.T.F. Me & Chris were not going to wait in line for 2-3 hours for a stupid boy band, so we didn't go. Turns out that we should've gone, since for some odd reason, they were giving out passes to the Girls' Generation fan meet. Shann ended up getting a pass, and said we probably could've gotten one too, if we were there.You can't even imagine how mad we were. And Shann kept on sending us pics of how close he was. He was in the 1st row for 4minute & Sistar, and then maybe 3rd row for Girls' Generation. Freakin' lucky...

4minute

Shann's"pics or it didn't happen"-proof pic

Sistar

Girls' Generation

Our seats weren't bad, but the next level down wasn't even sold out. And they moved the people in the next level up down to our level to fill it out. We kinda felt cheated, but whatever.

The MCs of the concert, and as far as my camera could zoom. That's my girl Tiffany from Girls' Generation and two dudes from somewhere.

This the American pop band Karmin, peforming at a Korean pop concert. Why, I have no freakin' idea. But they rocked.

My lovely view of the wall of girls in front of us when the first boy group, CNBlue, was performing. We didn't really mind or care.

The group we mostly came for, Girls' Generation This time, all 9 of them were there (last time, only 7 of them performed).

All the performers on stage at end.

Each group did 4 songs, but it seemed to go by really fast. Before we knew it, the concert was over. And we were sad. Until next time.

For 2012, I gave up fried chicken & all chicken wings. It is now the middle of November, and I'm almost there. And still, my cousins forget. Mostly Shann, but recently Jaymi too.

Shann: Yo cuz, I brought home some KFC.
me: uh-huh.
Shann: Yah, I got the big 12-peice bucket for all of us.
me: ........(just looking at him)
Shann: OH!! (the "oops, sorry" face)

me: (looking through freezer) hmm, what to eat for dinner tonight....
Shann: I got some tequila lime wings, they're hella good.
me: oh really?
Shann: Yeah, why you've never had it before?
me: .......
Shann: OH!! (the "oops, sorry" face)

(this time, it's through texts)
me: so where do you want to eat for your birthday?
Shann: Wingstop?
me: I can only eat the fries there.
Shann: LOL omg jk.
Shann: I forgot again.

Jaymi: How long do we normally marinate the korean chicken wings?
Jaymi: I marinated some wings Wednesday night, you wanna come over and eat? If you're brave enough to eat it hahah (note: it's Monday night)
me: really
Jaymi: haha i know.. You think it's still good?
me: should be good still
(I wait a lil to respond again, to see if she remembers. she doesn't)
me: but i gave up wings, remember?
Jaymi: Oh yeah!!!!! So sorry!!!!