Saturday, 29 November 2003
11:59pm
| H |
Wednesday - I tried to be on the road to L.A. to visit my family by 1:30PM, and I was successful at that, but what I quickly found out was that what I really should have done was leave on Tuesday night. So many people drive on Thanksgiving Eve. It took me over 3 hours to make a drive which I can usually make in about 2.
Wednesday night, I went out with my old college roommate Kenny to see Bad Santa. It was... bad. I mean, it definitely had some hilarious parts in a "you're on the bus to super hell if you think this is funny" way, but the overall package wasn't too great. They spent way too long dwelling on establishing how bad Santa really was. Once you get the idea that this guy is bad, the go ahead and show you again just in case you didn't catch it the first time. They waited way too long before actually trying to move the plot along.
Thursday - I had been looking forward to Thanksgiving for a long time. I love stuffing myself with food and I love being with my family. Thanksgiving in my family might very well be more important than Christmas, in many ways. Here I am with my cousin Michelle. My sister took the photo:
My legs are still sore from running around with all my little cousins outside, and my brain is still sore from playing chess against my cousin Justin. I'm just out of shape, all around. After dinner everyone settled in to watch Finding Nemo, but another cousin of mine, Jonathan and I snuck away to watch his Smallville DVDs instead. Not that I have anything against Nemo, it's just that I would prefer to see it for the first time on my own setup at home.
I did discover that my cousin Jason (who is in high school) and I have very similar tastes in movies. While persuing through his DVD collection, most of my other cousins had never even heard of half of the movies he had. I actually own most of the same ones, and the ones I don't own, I have at least made an effort to see. It was kind of weird discovering that, as he doesn't seem to talk very much at these family functions, but very refreshing to know that I'm not the only "weird" one in this family.
Friday - Yesterday,
I hung out with Zac (who I've known since we were in 6th grade), his wife
Karen (who I've known since they started dating in 11th grade), and their
daughter Rebecca, who I haven't seen since she was a few weeks old. She
was already huge then, but even bigger now at 6 months!
Here I am looking like I have absolutely no clue what I am doing. She certainly does have some very beautiful, big, blue eyes though! She seemed to enjoy my playing the guitar and singing to her... songs that tell sordid tales of prostitutes ("Roxanne"), oppression ("Master of Puppets"), and about how her dad only uses wimpy thin guitar picks because he only plays wimpy thin-pick songs. In jest, of course :)
That evening, Karen's mom came over to babysit, and the rest of us went out to the Jazz Kitchen at Downtown Disney for dinner. I winked and smiled at the hostess and she let us bypass the line and seated us immediately. Actually, that's not exactly what happened, but for whatever reason, she got us a table right away.
Once we got to the table, things changed a bit. Never before have I had food that tasted so good, that came with service that was so bad. But don't worry, this is not typical of this place, it was just this one waitress, as I've received excellent service from them in the past. I got the deep fried turkey, which was wonderful. If I manage to come back before the holiday season is totally over, I will definitely have to try the Turducken -- that's a turkey that's stuffed with a duck that's stuffed with a chicken. All boneless, of course.
Saturday - This morning I met up with Lawrence for breakfast. He was down here from the Bay Area with his girlfriend who hadn't been to Disneyland since she was in a stroller. I haven't seen Lawrence very much since he moved back up to the Bay, but it was great catching up with him again. I'm definitely going to have to plan a trip up to the Bay this spring to visit all of my various friends up there.
This evening I met back up with Kenny to catch a sneak preview of The Last Samurai. This movie was actually pretty darned good. The plot is very similar to Dances With Wolves, except it doesn't have all the parts where the main character whines about how bored and alone he is being stuck in the middle of nowhere. In other words, it's like Dances With Wolves, but without the parts that suck... and set in Japan, of course. I highly recommend it!
I guess that pretty much sums up this week. I've had a lot of fun, seen some good movies, discovered some things about my family, and of course, ate a lot of freakin' food. And now I guess I'll have to head back home to San Diego, and get back to work. Boo.