Hanging pictures straight is hard.

Goat Cheese

Is she really blogging about food again?

This is not a food blog. This is a blog about important things. I happen to find eating very important.

My most recent food important-things obsession is goat cheese. This weekend, I went to brunch with some friends in the city, organized by SF-brunch-blogger-and-friend Jenn at Triptych. Jenn is a vegetarian and she likes to joke that I am here Meat Consultant, which basically means that I "have" to eat bacon wherever we go, despite the fact that I have yet to offer or be solicited to write any bacon-or-otherwise-official review for Jenn or her blog. The bacon at Triptych was disappointingly thin and greasy, as was the service (Look up "hipster" on Google Images). However, I was wildly impressed by my goat cheese omelet and tater tots, which were neither thin nor greasy. In fact, my omelet inspired me to splurge at Trader Joe's last night on my new favorite thing: Goat cheese crumbles.

Fact: Goat cheese tastes good on everything. Here it is on last night's dinner: Pepperoni/corn/goat cheese pizza, spinach/corn/goat cheese salad, 2-buck-chuck. Okay, so the cheese isn't in the wine, but that's a drink so it doesn't really count.

Other things goat cheese crumbles taste good on: Bread, sandwiches, eggs, steak, potatoes, fruit, other kinds of cheese, bacon, a spoon... On the Wine Train last week, I even had goat cheese cheesecake!

This little $2.50 container is full of reasons that my week will definitely be a good one.

For another brunch blog, go to Twin Sister Corey's blog, The Wild Brunch!

Wine Train

Charlie Brown: We've got another holiday to worry about. It seems Thanksgiving Day is upon us.

Sally Brown: I haven't even finished eating all of my Halloween Candy...

- A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving

After Halloween, it's all a big holiday blur, isn't it? I always thought holidays were well-planned, when I thought about the fact that Christmas and My Birthday are almost exactly six months apart. And then I realized that everyone's birthday is not in June. As previously discussed, I don't really consider Halloween to be an important part of the holiday season, but it did trigger the beginning of my online Christmas shopping, so I guess I can't say I'm immune to the October 31st sugar celebration.

All of a sudden, I found Thanksgiving Day upon me. I haven't been home to North Carolina since June, but the idea of flying across the country during the busiest travel week of the US calendar year has never really appealed to me. This year, though, the West Coast was graced with my parents' presence, so we all prepared for a four-or-five day tour of the Bay Area to see family (and, in my case, various shopping malls. I'll get to that later, sort of.).

The hype of Thanksgiving Day is kind of awkward, isn't it? We've all seen The Santa Clause, where Tim Allen burns the turkey and then they have to go to Denny's for Christmas dinner. So many family members to get together, cook for, and find sleeping places for... As a firm believer in detailed logistical planning, I'm glad no one wanted to come to my San Jose apartment for Thanksgiving, that's for sure! A couple of years ago I decided to forgo the logistics and head to Mexico with my friend Nicole on a cruise. It was fun, but it was missing that special holiday feeling. Maybe because it was 85 degrees. This year for Thanksgiving, we celebrated a second holiday, i.e., my cousin Ana's 21st birthday. And where else, but the Wine Train in Napa Valley?

There are Corey and Ben with their commemorative wine glasses, courtesy of Ana's godparents. Hard to tell in the picture, but look closely at the base of Ben's glass: it's green, and it changes colors! I bet that feature only becomes increasingly amusing, the more glasses of wine you drink. Mental note: Ask Ana. The Wine Train took us through some of the vineyards in Napa on a leisurely ride; In hindsight, I wish I had eaten breakfast so I could have sampled more of the wines. I made up for breakfast, though, with the three pounds of turkey and sides and dessert that made up my Thanksgiving "dinner" (lunch) on the train. I had so much turkey, I barely stayed awake long enough to drive my grandmother and little sister back to the East Bay. Asleep by 5pm, up again at midnight for some Black Friday shopping!

Here are Erin and I at the end of the train ride, falling asleep at the dinner table.** Our Black Friday shopping experience is a blog topic for the future, or it might not be if I decide I'm too embarrassed to go into any elaboration beyond the hour I woke up to get started. Incidentally, a picture of the trunk of my car may suffice.

**Note: We did not actually fall asleep at the dinner table, though I have definitely done that before. At least twice in the last year. Another future blog topic...

Thanksgiving: Sneak Peek

When I ask for "a couple lumpia" at my grandmother's house, this is what happens...

Actually, this is what happens... plus two more pieces of lumpia that aren't pictured. I ate it all. And it's only Tuesday! I think this is telling of how the rest of the holiday week will go, and I'm definitely not upset about it.

As my other grandmother says... Happy Turkey Day!

Fonts.

Sometimes, when I don't have anything else to think about (like when I'm trying to fall asleep or driving or at work... just kidding), I think about what I'll write about in my next blog post. The low post count this month should give you a pretty good idea of how fast I've been falling asleep lately, because I've been a bit lacking in inspiration. One thing I do think about quite frequently though, is the idea of a blog mini-series or repeating theme/topic. In theory, it would make blogging much easier by having some automatic suggestions of things to write about. The actual topics that I've come up with, however, might put a strain on the level of amusement of my readers i.e., my family members and roommate.

Blog series/topic ideas:

1. Pet Peeves

2. "One time I was eating and..."

3. Things I think about when watching Law and Order

...and the topic which overarches today's post and many others: Things you didn't think were important, but I'm about to prove otherwise.

Fonts are really important. They say a lot about a person. Sometimes I get a really serious email at work, but then the email signature has the sender's name in something ridiculous like Curlz MT, and I no longer find the email to be remotely serious. This person actually took the time to

think, I'm going to change the font of my email signature to draw attention to my name... which font should I use? Oh, this one with the name that ends in a "-z," that's so professional. That can't actually go through someone's mind, right?

Same with resumes. I used to screen resumes when I worked at a small financial planning office. My boss would print applicants' resumes and hand me a stack of them, and then I would go through and look for good candidates. This can be very tedious, because many people are of the mindset that the more things they fit onto one page, the better. (Tip: That isn't true at all.) However, when I came across any resume written in Comic Sans, it went straight into the shredder. I couldn't even use it as scratch paper because I might accidentally look at the font and become ill.

Here's a fun BBC video about fonts: Click!

Best quote: "Make sure if you're going to use Comic Sans for your CV, that you're applying to become a clown."

Ikea

This blog is my new obsession: http://chezlarsson.com/myblog/

It is a very well-written and comprehensive blog (lots of pictures but not too many, and lots of links to other cool things on days when I have already watched 6+ consecutive episodes of L&O and need a break). It also combines lots of things that I love: cool interior design, not spending too much money, and they live in Sweden! About a year and a half ago, I got really into learning Swedish. The blog is in English, but there are little Swedish glimpses all over the blog... like Swedish labels for her well-organized drawers, thick socks and gray sky through the windows, and the fact that everything looks so futuristic and clean!

One Swedish think about it that I don't like, though? Ikea. This

blog features lots of things from Ikea. Ikea is a Swedish company that offers "affordable solutions for better living." In my experience, though, it offers cheap solutions for college students and recent graduates. Whenever I think of Ikea, I think of that "Malm" dresser that is in every college student's apartment. Yeah, that one. It seems like one of those things you buy because it's simple and fades into the background of your space to mak

e cool things like posters and rope lights stand out, but actually it's like having a giant cardboard box in the corner of the room. There's not much to it, but it's huge and not very fun to look at. But you can't help looking at it. (Sorry, Corey, I know you have this dresser, but sometimes I wish you would just paint it with pink nail polish like the rest of your stuff. It doesn't look bad where it is now in the hallway of your apartment with pink clothes spewing out of the drawers, though.)

Have you ever been to Ikea? It's a serious fire hazard. You go in thinking, "Oh, I'll just go buy a Malm dresser. I bet it's really easy to find." So you walk in and enter a dangerous labyrinth of furniture and Swedish accessories and signs that you may never escape. Thanks for providing that map, Ikea. That looks super helpful. I'll just walk in and go up the escalator and go straight and then left and then left and then right and then left and -- oh look at that cool circular shelf that can't possibly serve any functional purpose... wait, what the hell is a "bin number"? -- and then right and then left.... and that's only to get through the first third of the showroom. What if there were a fire or you realized you left your kid in the car when looking at that circular shelf? How would you get out? Because in your panicked state, you definitely couldn't just glance at the map and navigate back the way you came. And even if you could, that escalator only goes up, it doesn't go down.

But I digress. The Larssons actually do a quite impressive job of integrating Ikea pieces into their Swedish home without coming across like a college dorm room. I think it might be because they are actually Swedish. On the other hand, the only Swedish people I actually know don't even like Ikea. The Larssons do a lot of their home projects and renovations themselves, and most of the projects come out looking both presentable and maybe even manageable projects to attempt myself, one day.

Cold.

It's that awful time of the year in the Bay Area where the weather takes a vicious turn from boiling hot to ice cold. I have often been emotionally bogged down in the winter months because I get so sad that I can't wear shorts and I have to wear socks and a coat (could be a minor case of SAD. Yeah, that pun was intended.). However, this year, I am determined to make the best of and maybe even enjoy the cold!

Immediate resolutions:

1. Avoid shopping malls. Except Black Friday, I might not be able to resist!

2. Check the weather forecast in the morning and dress appropriately. For some reason, a common mistake that I make is to hope that the weather will be warm and sunny, and somehow think that will translate into magically cancelling the probable cold and rain. Lesson learned: Scarves and hooded coats keep the rain away much better than crossed fingers.

3. Stock up on delicious coffee beans and pretty To-Go coffee mugs.

I already solved one winter personal problem today at Target. One of my many winter personal problems is that I hate gloves. It's so annoying when you have to take them on and off to do practical things like picking my nose using my touchscreen phone(s). Yep, now that I work in the tech industry, I feel the need to be tech savvy, but how can I be tech savvy if it is such an annoyance to take my gloves on and off in the winter to use my phone? Solution: Touchscreen gloves! The pair in the picture is boring and not mine; my gloves are bright yellow with grey fingertips. The different-colored fingertips make it so you can use your screen without taking off the gloves! It works really well too, my coworker Bea and I tested it out plenty before we bought them. In case you're interested, it works because there's a conductive material interwoven into the thumb and forefinger to make the touchscreen sensitive to the gloves because of magic! I'm so excited about my new gloves that I almost forgot that I'm so cold (indoors, even) that I can't feel my nose.