Sunday in Bakersfield

Sunday was short and sweet. Matt and I met Laszlo for breakfast at one of his favorite places, the Arizona Cafe. He likes it because they serve authentic Mexican food for breakfast. And they really do. The boys were a little too tired for Laszlo's usual bloody mary (which is another reason he loves the Arizona) but we did get some authentic Mexican food. I ordered the huevos rancheros, which came out covered in Chili colorado. Interesting. I've never had anything like it before, but it was delicious! My favorite part is their tortillas. They taste homemade and delicious! I love them and have been craving huevos rancheros since then. Anyways, maybe not the best breakfast EVER but definitely unique!!! After we finished up with breakfast, Laszlo went back to the house to take care of Alice and Matt and I saw The Adjustment Bureau. I loved!! the movie. Emily Blunt + Matt Damon...who could complain. Plus it was nice to get to just hang out with my boyfriend :) I missed our date nights a lot. Plus our tickets were $5.50. Who could complain? After the movie, we headed back to Laszlo's to say goodbye and so Matt could hitch a ride back to San Diego.

I definitely wouldn't rule out another trip to Bakersfield! Granted it's probably not for everyone. Although we loved it for the 24 hours we were there :)

Road Trip Part IV: Sunnyvale/San Francisco

So back to our trip...we finally got back to Sunnyvale on Sunday around 1ish. We figured out that I have Directv at my house, which means I don't get the local channel that plays the Giants baseball games, so we decided to go to a bar. We drove to downtown Sunnyvale and found a place called Murphy's Law, which has happy hour all day on Sunday. Coincidentally, it was also the first real season game for the Niners, so the bar was packed. I officially love Murphy's Law...the TVs are HUGE, the drinks are cheap (I got a Guinness for five bucks), and everyone loves the Giants there. The only downside is that they don't serve food (but they do allow you to bring food in from outside). We hung and watched the game for a few hours with my friend David. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring a camera, so instead I'll just post a picture of the Giants. We beat the Padres that day, 6-1.

via http://sanfrancisco.giants.mlb.com

On Monday, we took my little brother Kery shopping to get new clothes for school. Seeing as how Matt is such a fashionista, I dragged him along to help us out. We hit up the Great Mall in Milpitas and started with Old Navy. Since Matt gets his 30% off discount there, we figured we could pick up a few basics from there. My brother ended up getting a few pair of jeans, a jacket, a thermal, a couple tshirts just from Old Navy...for only $75 bucks! It is so incredibly not fair how much cheaper it is buying clothes for guys than it is buy clothes for girls. He also picked up some tshirts from the Nike Store, where I got a Giants Hat and a Giants zip up hoodie (which you will see me wearing to the Giants game below) and Matt also picked up a Giants tshirt. We found my brother a fresh pair of kicks...and Matt got himself a new pair of moccasins. Matt and I also picked up matching black polos from the Polo store...try not to laugh at us if you see us wearing them together. Overall, I think it was a day well spent. You have no idea how much my mom appreciated us taking him shopping! Later that night, Matt and I used a groupon I bought to an Italian restaurant called Vaso Azzurro in downtown Mountain View. If you've never been to downtown MV, it's just about the cutest place ever with all these adorable restaurants. I love it there...it's great for date night! We ended up eating outside since it was so nice and Matt ordered a delicious chicken dish while I opted for a spaghetti dish. He also got to try a new beer, which I have forgotten the name of...but we all know how much Matt loves beer. Our meal was delicious, and I highly recommend this place if you are ever in the mood for Italian. We decided to skip dessert there and instead opted to get gelato from a popular gelato-ery called Classico Foods which has officially convinced me that gelato might be one of God's most awesome-est gifts to the world. Again, this place is also highly recommended by us. Afterwards, we called up my friends to see if any of them wanted to go bowling. There's a bowling alley right next to my high school (where coincidentally you could take a PE bowling class and just bowl during first period of high school every day). Only David responded, so the three of us headed over to Homestead Lanes. On Mondays, you can rent shoes and play a round for $2 each. We paid for 2 rounds each, 3 pairs of shoes, and a pitcher of Bud Light. Of course, I ended up losing every round, and I think that David crushed us. Matt ended up somewhere in the middle. As you can tell, I don't really plan on having a future in bowling. Overall, it was a successful night and very typical of Sunnyvale.

As you can tell, the night got progressively
darker until we were eating in the dark...

The next day, Tuesday, was our San Francisco day trip. This was the best day ever. Amber, Matt, David and I got on the Caltrain at 11:30 and arrived in San Francisco at 1:00. Since I had made a sign for the game, we had to lug it around San Francisco. Our first stop was Chinatown because we wanted cheap Chinese food for lunch and Matt wanted $2 tshirts. We walked from the train station to Chinatown, which took a good 30 minutes, so by the time we got there, we were starving. We picked the second place we passed called Snow Garden or something like that. I think secretly we all chose this place because it had orange walls! The lunch specials were decently cheap, about $7 bucks each and the food was yummy. Amber ordered egg rolls on top of her meal, which was an excellent choice! We all chowed down our food (except David, because it was his first meal of the day and he rarely eats very much for that first meal) and paid. I was a little irked to find out that gratuity was already added on our bill...what kind of place does that for lunch for only 4 people? Regardless, we decided it was time to shop! We stopped in this mega store that sold almost everything you would never need...like orange hair (wait til you see the picture of David's getup). We bought these poppers that you throw on the floor...they make a loud popping sound upon contact. The boys pretty much spent the rest of the day throwing them at our feet. We finally found a place that was selling tshirts for $1.88. That's insanely cheap. Amber and I each bought a "I heart SF" shirt while Matt bought 2 San Francisco shirts (that sort of have the Giants logo on them). After we finished shopping, we decided we would go bar hopping. After walking another half hour to get back onto 2nd street, we decided to stop in a bar called Steff's. They didn't have happy hour, but beers were only 5 bucks...so we figured why not? I'm glad we stopped here because they have free popcorn and free darts. It was definitely an older crowd, mostly guys who just got off work or guys who didn't work at all...seemed like a bunch of regulars. We each got a beer and chowed down on some popcorn (I would go to this place just for the free popcorn). The next bar we went to was an irish pub called Kate O'Brien's. Amber and Matt, in honor of the irish pub, got Guinness. It was Amber's first time drinking Guinness since Ireland!! I got a Boddington's, which is like a cream ale...delicious! It's like cream soda + beer. We decided to grab a snack here, since it was happy hour. Amber and I shared an order of potato nachos...we probably only ordered a snack because we wanted to know what the potato nachos were like. It turns out that it's just like regular nachos, except they use potato chips instead of tortilla chips. I think I'm going to start making my nachos like that! Matt got an order of wings, which turned out to be 3 wings total...slight disappointment. Next, we went to a thai restaurant called Ozone, because they had ten dollar pitchers of blue moon. We got a pitcher and some more food, since we didn't want to buy food at the game (which we definitely ended up doing). The food was yummy, and this place was packed with Giants fans, so it was a fun experience, but nothing spectacular. My favorite was a bar called 21st Amendment. In honor of the Giants game, they were having a beer garden in the alley. The beer garden just turned out to be an outdoor area where you could buy beer...not that exciting. What was exciting was the beer...they have watermelon beer! It's absolutely my new favorite beer now, and you get a slice of watermelon with it! It's like a wheat ale with watermelon flavoring. I highly recommend it. At 21st Amendment, we saw some people wearing Dodgers apparel....we really had to refrain ourselves from yelling mean things at them. By the time we finished our bar hopping, it was time to get to the park. Amber ended up buying an orange hat from an outdoor vendor...definitely pricy, but worth it! When we got inside, it was packed. I can't believe that there were people brave enough to wear Dodgers apparel. We definitely heckled some of them. David ended up buying orange socks, because he was freezing. Amber and I each got a hot dog, which was exponentially better than any hot dog I've had at Petco Park...but that could be my bias towards the Giants. Unfortunately, this was the first game against the Dodgers, and it was our only loss against them. Of course, as we were walking out, we were surrounded by Dodger fans, who tried to heckle us and make us feel bad...but when you've got an entire stadium on your side, it's hard to lose. Plus we just kept reminding them to look at the standings...and that we'd make sure to say hello to them from the playoffs. Gosh I just hate Dodger fans. On a side note, one of my professors told us that if anyone wore Dodger gear to class, he would kick them out...he's definitely my favorite professor!! Anyways, the game was exciting and Amber and I got to hold up my sign!! Speaking of which, I got so much free stuff because people saw that I had made a sign. Some guy at the Caltrain station gave me his lucky coin, because he said I would need it if I wanted Buster to marry me. The caltrain man, who checks your tickets, gave us Jolly Ranchers and Butterfingers because he saw that we were Giants fans. And when Matt and I went to pick up our tickets from the will-call, the ticket man gave me a free pin...Giants fans are the best people ever :) Overall, this was my favorite day of our entire trip. Good friends, good food, good beer, good baseball, and the best city in the world!!!

eating in Chinatown!

the Chinatown Mega store

 

yummy popcorn bar

watermelon beer!!!

pitcher at Ozones!

we didn't get on TV :(

GO GIANTS!

Road Trip Part III: Los Angeles again

I don't know if I mentioned this, but the whole reason Amber and I drove down to so cal was because she had a recruitment workshop at UC Irvine. So I convinced her to drive down a day early so we could stop for famous burritos, pick up Matt, and hang out with Andrew. She agreed :) Anyways, where were we...so on Saturday, Amber drove down to Irvine for her workshop and Matt and I hung out with Andrew. We went to my dad's restaurant in the morning and feasted on dim sum for free (the perks of being my dad's daughter). I wish I had taken pictures, but we completely forgot to bring cameras. Here's a picture of dim sum (from Google) in case you have no idea what I'm talking about.

via http://library.thinkquest.org

Well since we had a few hours to kill until Amber came back, Andrew took us shopping in downtown Pasadena. There's a really big outdoor mall called Paseo Colorado, which had some very fun shops. Of course, Matt insisted we go into Brookstone, and Andrew agreed....so they could sit in the massage chairs for 10 minutes haha. Anyone who knows Matt knows that this is typical behavior for him. He would probably live at Brookstone if they let him. However, the coolest store we went to was the Pasadena Antique Mall....it really was its own little mini mall. I've never been a huge antique shopper, but I think it's mainly because I wouldn't really know the value of anything antique-y. However, this antique store definitely was pricey, because they probably found these antique items for cheap and then yanked up the price. I didn't buy anything, but it was really fun to wander around. They had aisles and aisles filled with books (and a whole architecture section that Matt looked through for about 15 minutes), along with old records and vintage clothing and shoes. They had a lot of collectible items based off of old cartoons, tv shows, movie stars, etc. I found piles of old Time Magazines, a whole section dedicated to Marilyn Monroe, and even a clearance room. It was such a blast from the past. I also found some metal signs...the kind that was popular back in the 30s or 40s advertising Coca Cola or root beer for 5 cents. I love these signs!

via http://hudsongoodsblog.com

The LOTR CDs

I definitely recommend antique shopping if you've never done it before. Even if you're just window shopping, it's a great way to kill some time. Matt actually found something awesome...he ended up buying the Lord of the Rings trilogy in books-on-CDs for around $13. It was quite the steal!! We must have spent a good 30-40 minutes just wandering through the shop. Afterwards, Matt and I convinced Andrew to come grab a beer with us at the Yard House. Originally, Andrew said he would just hang out while we grabbed drinks, but how can you turn down "the world's largest selection of draft beers?" Since we had already had brunch/lunch, we each grabbed a beer. Matt talked to the bartender to get some advice on the beer selection and decided to go with an IPA (India Pale Ale). I'm no beer expertise, so you'll have to ask Matt to explain that to you. I decided to try something new and ordered a beer blend called the Black Velvet, which was a mixture of Guinness Stout and Wyder's Pear Cider....maybe the best decision I've ever made. I wasn't a huge Guinness fan before (it nearly gave Matt (and Amber) a heart attach when he found out I didn't like it), but now I've jumped on board the Guinness Train. If you ever get to go to the Yard House, get a beer blend if you don't like beer. Even if you do like beer (like me), you should still get a blend...because where else would they serve you a beer blend? We spent a little time watching the Saturday college football games and finally decided to let Andrew go home and study (because that's what med students do...if you keep them away from the books for too long, they get anxious haha). 

The Black Velvet

Well, while Andrew was studying...I heard from Amber, who asked us if we would mind staying an extra night. Andrew was supposed to hang out with his girlfriend, Gina, and Matt and I didn't want to crash their date. So we came up with a plan. I called my dad and asked him if we could borrow his car while he was working and he said yes! So Matt and I decided we would have Andrew drop us off at my dad's restaurant (which was like 10 minutes from Andrew's). We bade Andrew farewell and took off to the Citadel Outlets where we walked around and shopped some more. Matt was trying to decide whether or not he should buy a pair of swim trunks. The ones he wanted were a bright neon blue, and I picked up another pair, which was a royal blue, and told him that I liked the royal blue pair more. But Matt decided to get his neon pair. The underlying reason I'm telling you this story is because even though Matt won't admit it, he refused to buy the pair I picked out because they were Dodger blue. And we all know how Matt feels about the Dodgers. We also went into the Old Navy outlet store, but nothing really caught our eye. For an outlet store, it wasn't really selling any outlet-y stuff for cheap. We didn't end up shopping very long because we were both starving. Andrew had recommended a famous french dip restaurant in Los Angeles, so we headed to Philippe's. I'm not sure if you guys have ever heard of this place, but they claim to have invented the French Dip (and I must admit, they did a darn good job). If you've ever been there, you'll notice that it's not exactly the nicest area at night, but if you've got a big strong man (like Matt), it's worth the trip. I'm sure when Philippe's opened in 1927, their sandwiches were not $5.75 a pop, but in my opinion, 5.75 is worth it for the yumminess of these sandwiches. We both ordered the Beef French Dip (with Swiss cheese) and we tacked on two lemonades and a potato salad. If I was yelping this place, I would give it a four. I was a little disappointed because Philippe's sandwiches come pre-dipped. There is no actual dipping process for the customer, which in my opinion is the best part. But what I really enjoyed was the experience. Their dinner menu was very simple and the whole place seems to have changed very little since 1927. It was sort of like a cafeteria, but not the school kind. In my mind, I could almost see the factory workers coming in during their lunch break and plopping down at the rows of tables with their trays of food. It's a very unique experience, and another blast from the past (seems to be the theme of the day). When you check out their website, make sure you click on the history tab :)

via http://la.foodblogging.com

After our delicious (but simple) dinner, we headed to Diddy Riese in Westwood Village by UCLA. Diddy Riese is maybe one of my favorite places in the entire world (well it would at least make my Top 10 list). Diddy Riese is an ice cream shop, or maybe it's a cookie store...actually it's just the ultimate ice cream sandwich shop. This place is famous amongst UCLA Bruins and is well worth the drive. I'm actually glad we stayed in Los Angeles an extra night, because it gave us the chance to go to Diddy Riese. It was Matt's first time!!!!!! We parked in the Village and walked over to Diddy Riese. Did you know that in Westwood, you can cross a street diagonally (like on Rodeo Dr.)...it saves you a little time and walking. Well, of course we waited in line (for about 10 minutes), but it was well worth the wait. Matt and I each ordered an ice cream sandwich for $1.25 (I know, the price is part of the magic of DR) and also each ordered a dozen cookies (for $3.00)! I was going to get a sandwich for Amber, but I had a gut feeling it would melt before I got it to her. I ordered butter pecan ice cream with cinnamon sugar cookies, while Matt ordered chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream with chocolate chip cookies. In my opinion, I think that sandwich changed his life, but you'll have to ask him about that yourself. Diddy Riese has also been around for a while, since 1983, and I'm sure that it was well worth the wait back then too. Though this night was very spontaneously planned, it was exactly what I needed: a cute date night with my favorite guy, so thanks for making us stay the extra night Amber :) I love cute date nights with my cute boyfriend :)

life-changing moment.

Only in Los Angeles :)

PS. look at the cute dog we saw while we were waiting in line!!