Browse Category: work

Personal Sanity Lunch Truck Day

On Tuesday, I took a “Personal Sanity Day” from work and had a productive yet adventurous day.  I had two rolls of 120 film sitting in my house for the last 2 years and thought this would be the perfect day to go to the camera shop to turn them in.  Being able to wander downtown on a regular work day made me feel like a tourist in my own city.  There’s a different vibe in the streets compared to the weekend.  There are lots more people, cars, and sounds.  All the stores are open and you are more likely to find random lunch trucks and street carts around every corner.

On my way over to the Ferry Plaza, I found a street cart that was selling onigiri.  Yum.  It was $1 so I thought I’d give one a try.  This teriyaki chicken one was tasty.

At the Ferry Plaza, Hapa Ramen was there along with a couple other food stands.  Inside, I went to Miette for a couple French macarons and a gingerbread cupcake.

I also walked past Jes’ work building and found a lunch truck selling Japanese curry.  Score!  I called him up at 12 and we ate lunch across the street before his 1:00 meeting.  I had pork katsu curry and Jes had the chicken.  Both were yummy and very satisfying.  Apparently they’re parked out there every Tuesday…lucky Jesse.

Valentine’s Day

Jes and I don’t really celebrate Valentine’s Day anymore but I still think it’s kinda fun when you’re around kids.  Another therapist and I brought in some of those cheesy valentines from the grocery store and we made mailboxes for each of the kids out of empty glove boxes and wrapped them in butcher paper.  Each kid had their mailbox taped to their hospital room door and they all took turns making and delivering them to each other.  They were all pretty excited about it all.

For dinner, Jes made a steak, green beans, and mashed potatoes.  It was tasty.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Preventing Alzheimer’s

Lately, I’ve been feeling my age: I wake up with a sore neck and back every morning; my cuts heal slower; and I realized that my 18-year-old patient is half my age.  Oh crap.  So, I borrowed my co-worker’s ukelele and I’m teaching myself how to play.  It’s a lot of fun and I can play a handful of chords now.  I’ve been learning on the internet and got a few copies of different songs from another co-worker who had a book of songs.  I still have some practicing to do before I can play for anyone.  For now, Jes will have to just bear with me.  I just wish I could sing.

Another thing that I’ve been wanting to do is improve my Conversational Spanish.  I’ve had the same patient for the last 10 weeks and his mom speaks primarily Spanish.  I feel like a retard speaking to her and thought I should brush up a little.  So, last night I went to my first class at the City College.  It’s Level One and it’s super basic but I still learned a thing or two about cultural stuff for when to use the tu and usted forms.  It’s only one night a week for seven weeks.  We’ll see if it’ll be worth taking Level Two.

a sigh of relief

Friday was the perfect day for a happy hour since we had so much to celebrate: the end of a tough week, Michelle’s last day of her 3-month internship with us, and Ranee’s arrival back in SF for the holiday.  We went to Conga Louge for some $5 Mai Tais and appetizers.  We love this tiki bar even though they have become a lot stricter about how many people you can have in your party.  Luckily we had just enough to max out the 12-person limit and then snuck in a couple extra by the end of the evening.

It was great to be able to celebrate Michelle’s achievements and to give her a proper send off into the real world.  It was also nice to be able to hang out with our old friend Ranee.

We also got to meet Teresa’s baby brother Patrick who had also just arrived from Chicago for the holidays.  We love bringing family to our happy hours.

Afterward, most of us made it down the street to Ici for some tasty ice cream.  I got to taste their Salted Coconut Pecan and Candied Cacao Nib flavors this time.  They were delicious and it felt so good to be outside in the rain.  Once that was done, we headed over to Gordo for a little bite to eat.  I shared a chicken burrito with Michelle and it was just the right amount to get me sobered up for the drive home.

Holiday Party

On Saturday night, I hosted a Holiday Party for my co-workers.  We are a deprived bunch and deserved a more festive party this year compared to our pathetic lunch last year.  We had about 40 people show up and we had lots to eat and drink while enjoying each other’s company.  I ordered all the food from Pete’s next door and also made a Costco run for appetizers and drinks.  Everyone chipped in $20 per person and also brought their own booze to make this all possible.

Midway through the party, we had some familiar faces singing Christmas carols for the crowd.  Jes and I had bid on this at a fundraiser and found out a couple weeks ago that it was actually a bunch of people we already knew.  So, when they started singing, I called Victor and Susie to come down to watch too.

By the end of the night, the older folks went home and we were left with the usual HH crew and their significant others.  We continued to eat and drink and played a silly game of “Celebrity”.  Overall, the party was a success and we all had a fun time celebrating the end of the year.

Here are the photos from the party.

Pre-Thanksgiving Weekend

Last Wednesday (11/17), Brother, Joy, and Mommy came up to visit me.  The timing coincided with a bunch of things that I already had planned for the week and they somehow came together just fine.  I picked them up on Wednesday night and they spent Thursday exploring the city and also went to Alcatraz.  Meanwhile, I went to work and we also had our annual Craft/Bake Sale Fundraiser.

We always have a Happy Hour afterward so the family took BART over to the East Bay and got to meet the gang at work.

HH was at Marc 49 and we had a fun evening decompressing from the crazy month of planning and the actual fundraiser.

The interesting part of the evening was that I saw my mom drinking a beer for the first time!  For all my life, she didn’t drink but I guess retirement has changed things.

On Friday, I already had the day off to visit the de Young Museum with Stephanie.  So, that morning, I took the family to Mama’s for pancakes and waited a good 45 minutes to get in.  Luckily no one was in a hurry so we endured the wait and had a feast of pancakes, french toast, eggs, and corned beef hash.  Afterward, we met up with Stephanie at the mall and headed out to Golden Gate Park.

The family went to the California Academy of Science and the two of us went to the Van Gogh exhibit.  It was a rainy day but it didn’t matter.  We all still had a good time.

Later that evening, we met up with the rest of the girls at Embarcadero Center for Light-up Night.  HH was at Osha Thai where we enjoyed appetizers and Effen drinks.

By 6:30, we paid the tab and headed outside for the lighting and caught the fireworks in the rain.

Immediately after the fireworks, we walked over to the Hyatt for the tree lighting.  Unfortunately it was quite a production and we had some time to kill.  That was when things got a little fuzzy since people were at the bar and bringing me tasty drinks.

About 20 minutes later, they started the countdown and the snow fell while the lights turned on.

My mom eventually got tired and took Muni home.  Meanwhile, the girls took off for snacks at Palomino while Jes, Brother, Joy, and I headed over to One Market.  Sometime between the Hyatt and the restaurant I fell ‘cuz I woke up the next morning with a huge scuff on my knee.  Whoops.  As dinner started, Joy wasn’t feeling well so we went home early while the boys finished dinner.  As I was taking care of Joy, I got a text from Jes that said “Peanuts in your brother’s dessert.  Hooray.”  Here’s his side of the story:

Yep, he was struck by the peanut monster once again and ended up yacking at the restaurant and in the street on the way home. What a mess.

The next day we took it easy as everyone was recovering from a fun fun evening.  We had porridge and fried dough for breakfast, grilled cheese and tomato soup for a snack, and then Bakesale Betty’s for lunch.  Yum Yum…if that doesn’t take care of a hangover, nothing will.

Before taking the family to the airport, we stopped at Modern Mouse for Eleen’s anniversary party.  We got to hang out with friends and browse the merchandise as the rain poured down.  The drive to SFO was a little scary but we made it and the family got home safely after an hour-long flight delay.

Here are the rest of the photos from the weekend.