Weekend with Sarge

It was a good weekend spent with Sarge, who was very generous in many ways. He said he ejoyed his time, and hopes to come again, so he can hike in the hills. Me, I was flying on autopilot part of the time; perhaps it was the lack of sleep. Or my version of ADD was present.

On Saturday we met up with my friend RHK and his girlfriend for lunch at that restaurant next to Miyake. (For some reason the official Cupertino website is pretty weak when it comes to its listings for restaurants.) Once I find the name of the restaurant maybe I'll post a review--the food was ok. It's self-serve, like Armadillo Willo's--place your order at the counter, pick it up. The food is mostly Italian/fusion? It's ok, and lunch isn't pricey. After lunch, Sarge and I headed to San Francisco--alas, it was foggy and raining so we didn't see much. Then we headed off to Japantown so I could stop by Kinokuniya. Sarge was a bit disturbed by the anime/manga fans there. Dinner was at Emperor's Palace, we were lucky enough to find a parking spot close by. Sarge didn't like the spicy salt pork ribs there, but he agreed that the food there was good for the price. (Unfortunately they ran out of rice noodles so he couldn't sample the beef chow fun.) Then we drove around SF a bit, hitting North Beach, Fisherman's Wharf and Nob Hill.

On Sunday we went to the 11:00 low Mass at Our Mother of Perpetual Help Oratory. We then drove to Pleasanton to meet up with his army buddies, RP & JB. We headed out to Macaroni Grill, where P was trying to get the attention of our waitress, Kristine. The couple at the table next to ours noticed that JB was wearing a "Harley Davidson" shirt featuring Baghdad as the location and asked if they were in the army. They thanked them for the service, and then RP told them that he was trying to get the waitress's phone number, so they spoke to their waitress to see if they could get any info about her. The wife advised RP to leave a note for her. At Macaroni Grill there is a paper "tablecloth" on which waitstaff write their names, but backwards and upside down.) RP left a note on that paper, along with his phone number. No call from her yet.

I don't care for the food at Macaroni Grill--it tastes overcooked. Not good Italian...

His friends seem to be good guys, and both are interested in careers in law enforcement. But perhaps it should go without saying that you can tell they are guys and that they have been in the military--that is if you know anything about "guy talk." haha. We also took a walk around the mall, and went back to Hacienda Crossings Shopping Center (the Macaroni Grill where we had lunch is also located there) so Sarge could get his Coldstone fix for the day. There was a cute brunette working at Regal Theaters... but she's probably too young. (We were hanging out there because two of the guys needed to use the restroom, and then we stayed there to chat a little.)

We then headed back to RP's house where we met his mom and stepfather. After we said our byes, Sarge and I drove back to the hotel. We later went back to Milpitas Square for dinner--the congee place (I forgot the name...), just beyond Kam Do/Golden Island and Darda. It turns out that this place is Taiwanese. The congee was ok, the chow fun not dry enough, and the spicy salt ribs overcooked. I won't be going to that place again, it's overpriced for that quality of food. ($8.99 is the average price for an entree.) I did walk by Jacko's to see if the woman was working there, but it is closed on Sunday. There was a wedding banquet over at Mayflower--sounded like a Vietnamese wedding.

On Monday RP drove down and met us at the Hyatt, and we drove up to SF again. We had lunch at Great India on Geary (yelp--$7.99 for lunch buffet). The nan was good, and the food ok, though the tandoori chicken was a bit sour. (Because of lemon?) The food would have been better if it was warm. Much of it was cold, though. And they didn't have free refills for soda. (The guy was pouring coke out of a 2 L bottle.) I had two plates, less than usual, but I've been eating all weekend. I skipped dinner tonight because of all of the excess calories I've absorbed in the last 3 days.

We then visited the Golden Gate Bridge again so Sarge could take some pictures during the day. (We didn't get many photos on Saturday, though we dropped by twice, one in the afternoon when it was foggy, once at night.) Next stop: Lombard Street. And after that we took a walk around North Beach. No time for anything else--we left the city around 3:30 so we could get back in time for Sarge to catch his flight. I picked up my car, and then we headed back to the Hyatt so RP could get his. We were going to take 101 to get to the airport, but at 5:30 the freewas packed, and traffic was stop-and-go. So I decided to take the local roads to get there--Sarge had to drop off his car, and we reached the terminal a little bit after 6. But he made his 7:00 flight--not too many people flying on his flight or on any of the other airlines from Terminal C.

I drove over to Cinearts at Santana Row for tonight's 7:00 showing of Battlestar Galactica Razor. It was ok for a TV movie; it didn't have the resolution of a real movie. I still think the DVD version will be better, with the extra scenes. The movie focused mostly on the XO of the Pegasus, Kendra Shaw. The DVD version will have the extra scenes giving us the past of Admiral Cain and Bill Adama. While the movie doesn't give us any new major plot developments (I don't think it does, at least, but I didn't watch all of season 3), it does give us some small details. And some of the fans enjoyed watching the old-school cylons in action. (While they were not as bad as some of the over-aged anime/manga fans we saw at Kinokuniya, or some of the people who show up at No Name Anime, there were enough to make one have second thoughts about being associated with them. There was also an older woman, in her 40s or 50s [she had gray hair] who was breast-freeding her baby in public, without any sort of covering. That was a bit odd, and I woner what her story is.)

I still find the military aspects of the show annoyingly incorrect and much is exaggerated for the sake of drama and to compensate for the lack of a realistic scale. Perhaps the series finale will make be able to make the narrow focus on a few characters of the series credible, but we'll have to wait and see... and will Ron Moore have anything to say about religion? Are there gods or just one god in the BSG universe? And what providential role do the diety(-ies) play, if any?

I'd say the theater was only 70% full. I was surprised by that--I thought there'd be more BSG fans, and it seemed that there were more people on the list of names. Maybe some decided it wasn't worth the effort to go down to Santana Row to watch a TV movie on the silver screen.