Phil’s blog

While I was at work on Valentine’s Day, Justine spent the whole day decorating my room with flowers, streamers, balloons, chocolates, candles, doilies, and shiny heart confetti. I had no idea, so when I came home and opened the door to my room, I was totally floored. Almost every surface of my room was decorated in some way. It looks way more lively now and I’m still enjoying it. She also hid 12 easter eggs with candy and coupons in them, the latter being for massages and such. Wow. Thank you, Teeny! More photos.

Justine and I went up to Lake Tahoe a couple of weeks ago for the Google ski trip. The company only pays for a one-day lift ticket, but we went up a couple of days early and stayed three nights total at the Tahoe Inn in King’s Beach (a great deal at $30/night). We did a bunch of fun things and the area is beautiful. Here are all of our photos from the trip.

Hanging out on the shore

Lake Tahoe is stunning, and we had the great fortune to be there under clear, reasonably warm skies. According to a brochure, the water is so clear you can see a white dinner plate at a depth of 80 feet. The day after we arrived, Justine and I spent part of the afternoon lounging, skipping rocks, admiring the scenery, and taking photos on the shore at King’s Beach.

Ice skating

I had only been ice skating once previously, which was several years ago, so when we went to the rink at Northstar I was pretty much starting from scratch. Justine taught me the basics again and after a couple of circuits along the rail and some hand-holding, I was able to skate without any support. By the time we left I could go reasonably fast and without looking like too much of a goon. It was fun holding hands and skating with Justine, who is much better at it and able to do fancy stuff like going backwards. I was amused and inspired by a little boy who was unphased by repeated falls, and at one point actually came over to give me some advice :] He tried to explain how to do it but this basically amounted to something like “move your feet like this.” Cute.

All-you-can-eat sushi

We got dinner one night from Hiro Sushi in King’s Beach. For $26 you can order as much sushi as you can eat for one hour. The rules are that you can’t place a new order until you’re done with the current one, you have to eat all the rice, there’s a max of two hamachi (yellowtail) orders per person, and you can’t bring back leftovers. The chef was pretty responsive and we always had food in front of us. We ordered: 3x saba (mackerel), 3x hamachi, smoked trout, anago (sea eel), unagi (fresh water eel), ankimo (monk fish liver), soft shell crab roll, rainbow roll (crab roll covered with various fish and avocado), halibut roll, spicy albacore roll, and Hawaiian roll (tuna, mango, avocado, and macadamia nuts). My favorites were the hamachi and the Hawaiian. This was easily the best sushi meal ever, and needless to say I left the place cripplingly stuffed.

Snowboarding

Neither of us had snowboarded before so we took a group lesson which taught us how to: propel ourselves on flat areas with one foot, turn, and slow/stop our descent by keeping the board perpendicular to the slope and digging the rear edge into the snow. It hadn’t snowed for a while and the surface was icy, but we did reasonably well and had a great time. The weather was so warm I shed my jacket for a while and was wearing only a t-shirt! We snowboarded into nightfall, which was better with fewer people to crash into. By the end I was able to make it down the beginner slope we were on without falling, albeit pretty slowly. The scenery was gorgeous, especially as the sun was setting, casting pink across the sky.

Snowmobiling

We took a 2-hour snowmobile tour with Lake Tahoe Adventures on the last day of our trip. It was amazing! The route was pretty tame, but the tracks left by other snowmobiles made it kind of hard to control because our machine’s skis would tend to follow the grooves, but we both got the hang of it. Riding on the back with Justine driving was actually harder than driving myself because I was afraid I’d pull her off since she’s so small. I got used to it pretty quickly though and took a bunch of photos and videos over her shoulder. During one of the rest stops, one lady’s helmet rolled down a pretty steep hill and the guide took his snowmobile down to retrieve it. It would have been great to go off road and push the machines closer to their limits - perhaps next time we’ll sign up for something more advanced.

It’s time for another massive update; I haven’t posted for the past month because I was having too much fun with Justine :] She flew back to VA on Friday so I’ve had time to upload all the photos and recount the notable things:

• Took multiple trips to Maru Ichi. I think udon is edging out ramen as my favorite noodle again. We also tried Ramen House Ryowa but didn’t like it as much.
• Went to a public safety job fair and talked to reps from the FBI, Palo Alto police, private investigators, and a security guard contractor. From talking to the PIs, it seems their #1 type of case is worker’s comp fraud, possibly followed by cheating spouses. Justine wasn’t too excited about that, nor was she thrilled with the rent-a-guard company. The FBI dude told us pretty much what we already knew, but the Palo Alto PD rep was interesting. It sounds like a sweet job; $70k starting salary, mad benefits, and very little danger given the crime rate in Palo Alto. It sounded like a reasonable first step for Justine but the next academy semester doesn’t start until summer.
• Made the best homemade sushi ever. We used tuna, salmon, shiitake mushrooms, cucumber, avocado, and flying fish roe.
  
  
• Watched every episode of The Office. Justine had shown me one before and I wasn’t super impressed but we watched a few more from her season 2 DVDs and I was hooked. Downloaded and watched seasons 1 and 3 up to the current episode. Thank you Bittorrent.
• Received a visit from Miss Kitty, the neighborhood cat.
  
  
• Made multiple trips to Totoro. Two favorite dishes: soon dubu (tofu stew) and bi bim bop (grilled beef and veggies over rice).
• Had dinner at Xanh in downtown Mountain View with my friend Kathy and her husband Peter. Delicious, great decor and food presentation, but expensive. We shared an Asian pear salad, crab and quail egg soup, garlic noodles, cubed beef tenderloin, and shrimp puffs.
• Laid my motorcycle down going too fast into an easy turn, leaning and braking and causing it to slide out. Luckily damage was minimal both to the bike and myself. The left turn signal broke, the handle bar end got scraped, and I got a little scrape on my knee. Pretty amazing because the bike left a couple of long gashes in the asphalt. I was able to pick it back up pretty easily and rode it home. Haven’t not taken it out since; need to get it checked out at the local shop. I’m actually kind of relieved to have gone through my first bike accident. I guess it’s like getting hit for the first time; you think it’ll be awful but it ends up not being so bad. Actually I’ve never been in a real fight outside of sparring. Hope that day never comes.
• Went to Tahoe! More about this in my next post.
• Had a nice dinner with Justine’s aunt Amy, cousin Douglas, and his wife Mimi at Lotus Garden in Milbrae. Doug was excited about the prospect of Justine moving to the Bay Area. On the way to Doug and Mimi’s place we almost had an accident; one car stopped suddenly and completely in the middle of the 101 and the car behind it swerved first left to avoid it, then back right, presumably to avoid more cars. It ended up passing right in front of us, perpendicular to the lane, and off the road. I had started braking immediately upon hearing tires squeal and seeing the stopped car, and luckily we just missed the tail end of the swerving car as we passed. Scary.
• Played laser tag for the first time at Laser Quest in Mountain View. Justine had played before and gave me some tips, but I still got destroyed by a bunch of high school kids. It was kind of embarrassing but I had a good time. Justine is really good and got 4th place out of about 15 people both times we played. I think my problem is that my accuracy is horrible, so in a shootout on equal terms with no cover, the other person will usually win. Guess I need to practice..
• Made a chocolate cake and only succeeded in eating half of it while Justine was here. It was delicious though and we had fun baking and making a huge mess.
  
  
• Got Lego Star Wars II for the 360. I’m not a huge Star Wars fan but this game is cute, clever, and funny, and best of all, Justine loves it and is always up for playing. She even played it while I was at work!
• Made our own soon dubu and bi bim bop. They turned out pretty well, especially the tofu!
  
  
• Was surprised by Justine on Valentine’s Day More about this in a later post.