Birthday Biking?!?!

Leina will be turning the big 3-0 this coming January. And like past years, she has big plans for her big day. She has decided to bicycle from San Francisco to Los Angeles for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation! There was much excitement regarding these ambitious plans. Then, a certain close friend of hers, who she had railroaded into accompanying her, gave this a bit more thought.

She'd never seen Leina on a bike. She wasn't sure if Leina even had ever ridden a bike. Leina did own a bike; a classic, blue Schwinn which had hung from her ceiling as long as Erica had know her, but that bike may have been Liane's. She became more skeptical. "Leina, as soon as you get on a bike and ride it up Portola, then we can talk" about making this trip, Erica said to her.

There is some suspicion that Leina assumes it will be downhill all the way from San Francisco to L.A., because that's how it seems on the globe. But she is ambitious. It will be interesting to see whether she is still interested when she learns how much money she will need to spend on a decent road bike.

Driving Nephews to Sleep

Leina has a bad sore throat and can barely talk, though she still called Tony last night and had him tell her stories about how he went to the Cal basketball game against Kansas State and there was a guy on the Kansas State bench with a mohawk who everyone in the stadium was cheering to get into the game, and when he finally did with two minutes left, he didn't give them the pleasure of heaving even on off-balance three point attempt.

It is a well-known fact that many young children don't fall sleep when their parents want them to. Babies and toddlers don't seem to understand that just because you've sung them a song and tucked them in to bed, that means they should sleep. And what does one do when a child won't fall asleep? There are many theories on how to react, whether or not to respond to an insomniac child.

Leina has no children of her own, but has, on numerous occasions, found herself responsible for a nephew who just won't fall asleep. Now many people would just let the kid stay up, because who cares, he's not her kid anyways. But not Leina. She feels a moral obligation to make sure that any young male nephew or hers get his rest, one way or another.

Liane, or perhaps Noriko, explained to her that Dominic, or maybe Yuto, falls asleep best when he is being driven around. So on numerous occasions, Leina has taken to the streets with a youngster strapped into the backseat. This happens so often that she mentions it to her friends as though half the cars on the road were just taking leisurely drives in order to coerce a young passenger into nodding off. She recently explained a route that she took where she drove Dominic out to the zoo, past Pacific Heights, and essentially all over town, past many places that this author couldn't find with a GPS system in his car, and Dominic still wouldn't sleep.

What's more, she even passes this burden on to Charles. On Thanksgiving, while they were waiting for the turkey to come out of the oven, it was decided that Yuto should be asleep, and he wasn't in agreement with the decision. So somehow Charles found himself trying to get lost in Marin County with Yuto in the backseat, and the treatment much more effective on Leina, who passed out riding shotgun.

Mighty Warriors

Will has been very generous to Leina in the past, offering her tickets to see the Warriors on numerous occasions. He has season tickets, and Leina is usually happy to take him up on the offer. Sometimes, though, she can't find a date and then provisionally offers the tickets to a friend only to renege later on that offer. But only sometimes.

This time, Leina was taking Charles. She paid Will for the tickets which was the least she could do. She came down with a sore throat in the afternoon and then took a nap. Then Charles came over and he took a nap, while she agreed to stop by Erica and Tony's for fondue on the way. They brought baguettes of bread and some chicken apple sausage. When Leina asked what she should bring and rattled off a list of potential grocery items, Tony ridiculed Leina when she offered to bring apples. So she subversively brought apples, brought in sausage casing and mixed with ground chicken. There were also green beans, potatoes, cauliflower, and mushrooms for dipping.

The fondue was good and cheesy. Erica offered Charles a beer which Tony then unoffered because he was 'saving it.' But then he offered him a different beer, which Charles then was too scared to drink. They drove to the Ashby BART and then took BART to the game.

It was a good game. The Warriors upset the Jazz, giving them only their second loss of the season. Leina did a lot of cheering, which did not help her sore throat.

Leina woke up this morning feeling sick. She didn't call Auntie, who has been know to give medical advice in the past (and mis-spell vomiting), because she didn't want to bother her. And since she didn't have to go to work, she decided to waste her time and go to the doctor, who, predictably, told her to rest, gargle with salt water for comfort, and come back in if her symptoms didn't improve in three days.

Celebrating a Happy 21st

Leina today spent the day with Charles until about 5:00, when she gave him a ride home to Foster City. Erica and Tony and Erica's brother Carlito happened to also be going from San Francisco to Foster City at that exact time to hang out with Erica and Carlito's cousins and second cousins. So, naturally, she gave them a ride. Leina had offered to both drop off and pick them up an hour later, but she failed to mention that she wasn't going to do anything besides drop off Charles while in Foster City.

So while the three of them were cooing over new little second-cousins-once-removed, Leina was parked a block away, making phone calls to her friends and aquaintances. She talked to Alice's mom and Nicole Dare among others, until Erica called her and Leina said that they could go whenever, because she was parked a block away.

This day happened to be Carlito's 21st birthday, which was to be celebrated later that night with a dungeness crab dinner. Carlito was hoping Leina would come for he values the witty conversation she brings to the dinner table, but Leina really didn't want to go. She thought she could get out of it by offering to buy Carlito a drink beforehand. So he took her up on that offer.

Leina had the idea to get off 101 in Millbrae and find a real divey bar on El Camino Real. She was scared to go into the first divey bar that Tony and Erica noticed, but she got excited when she saw an Irish Pub, Finn McCool's. So they went inside, and she bought Carlito and Tony Guinnesses, Erica a heffeweisen. The bartender was very nice. He noticed from Carlito's ID that it was indeed birthday number 21, bought him a shot, a fancy shot of 18-year-old Bushmill's. For her drink, she asked the bartender what swee drinks he had. He asked, "How sweet?" That threw her off, and she started blubbering about not too sweet, but kind of sweet, and finally Erica interrupted and asked him if he had any recommendations. He did, and she ordered herself a melontini.

Leina tipped the bartender $5 on a $17 tab, but then they left after one drink and she felt bad that perhaps they should have stayed for a second drink or tipped him more.

Carlito, however, did not let her off the hook for dinner, and Leina's excuse about how she couldn't come over because she had to return Angie's DVDs to the library was widely ridiculed. She succumbed to the peer pressure and came over, where she managed to have a decent time.

Turkey of a Day

Some people who come from split families wind up celebrating two Thanksgivings. Yesterday, Leina somehow found herself eating turkey almost nonstop from 2:00 until midnight, at three different parties. And her parents stayed together their entire lives.

But before she could eat any turkey, she had to make some of the coconut creme pudding mentioned the other day in this space. Leina, however, had some difficulty with the recipe, but astutely woke up at 6:45 on Thanksgiving to start making it, with a soothsayer's sixth sense that something would go wrong. She fulfilled her prophecy and managed to screw up the recipe twice, starting over each time, until the third time was the charm. Then she had to drive someone somewhere before going home and taking a nap.

Then she went to Charles' parents' house for a meal, which was nice, and then drove somewhere else on the peninsula to have a Thanksgiving with The Poker Friends. It is surprising that The Poker Friends have not been mentioned here before, but the short is that they, for many years, played poker with her father, and became family friends. And Leina visits them every few months. What is confusing is that there are two unrelated sets of Poker Friends. Perhaps Leina's father played in two different poker games, and forged lifelong friendships in each. Poker can be a very bonding activity.

Anyways, she drove out to visit The Poker Friends and spend some time with them, and only ate a little bit of turkey because Auntie was making a big feast up in Marin for the family. So Charles (who had been by her side since noon) and she made the familiar drive from the southbay to the northbay, and arrived at Auntie's ready to eat one last time. The turkey, alas, did not go into the oven until 6:00, and one will find that when the turkey goes in the oven late, it comes out late: 11:30, the latest Leina had ever eaten a Thanksgiving turkey.

On the bright side, all turkeys were tasty, she didn't have to work the next day, and she managed to make her appearances at each location on time and see everyone she wanted to.

Way Beyond

Leina had a big problem today. She was baking a pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving. She had, in preparation for her busy day in the kitchen, splurged on a fancy set of metal spoons from Bed Bath and Beyond (probably these spoons). It was an angst-ridden decision, for Leina really didn't want to spend the $9.99, which after the 20% coupon which came in the mail earlier this month (which she has been known to use, even when expired) still cost over $8, after tax.

But she decided to reward herself for working hard and got the fancy set. She paid and brought them home so she could make this pie, which had somehow turned into a coconut pudding cake or something. No worries, now she would be able to accurately measure out the vanilla and cinnamon instead of using the cap or guessing. So the time comes to get one teaspoon of vanilla, and she reaches for her shiny new measuring spoons only to find: no teaspoon!!! Leina was furious! She could have simply measured two 1/2 teaspoons, but still! She then counted her spoons and noticed she was also short an 1/8 teaspoon, which she knew deep down was a useless measurement because when a recipe calls for that, it really just means a pinch of that ingredient. But out of principle, she jumped back in the car and drove to a different Bed Bath and Beyond to exchange it.

She wound up exchanging them for some cheaper, plastic spoons that had all the measurements.

Missed Stephen's party

This evening. Charles came over to hang out. Angie was hanging out with a bottle of wine, and Nicole was in her room. It became an even fuller house when Erica and Tony came over with burgers they had just bought from Tower Burgers, which they were going to eat before coming over but Tower closed at 9:00 and they had to get their burgers to go and eat them at Leina's dining room table. Leina traded a generous squirt of ketsup for a few fries, but not as many as she was hoping to, because Tony ate fast.

Angie, Tony and Erica left to go to Stephen Dodson's party, a birthday party of some sort with a lot of people that Leina didn't know (with the exception of the aforementioned guests, the host, and Serena, Bryon, Gavin and Will and Stephen's sister Katrina, all of whom asked about her). She missed a happening party, with Dom Perignon, Ketel One, and Batman Begins on the TV without the sound. A phone call was made to her, but she skipped it.

Why did she skip it? Liane and Dom are back in town! She had to pick them up at the airport but pick up Noriko first and then go back to her place and goo goo over how big Dom had gotten and then go to bed early.

Breakfast out

Apparently, last night did not involve enough heavy food for Leina and Charles. They decided to go out for brunch this morning at Mama's on Washington Square, in North Beach. As promised online, there was a line outside. During the wait, Leina called Erica and consult on the difference between eggs Florentine and eggs Benedict. For the record, Florentine has hollandaise and a bed of spinach, while Benedict has a slice of ham in place of the spinach.

Dinner out

Leina had not talked to Tony for a few weeks. She claimed that she had not returned a phone call of his on Thursday because "I fell asleep at 9:50." When pressed, she admitted it could have been 9:45 or even as late as 10:00. However, she did phone him last night around 6:30.

"You eaten yet?" she inquired. Tony had not, in fact, eaten. "Do you and Erica want to come over and eat something?" It turned out that Tony was in the midst of cooking a family recipe he had been meaning to make for several years--Marcella Hazan's Pork Loin Braised in Milk. So there was no reason for Leina and Charles not to come over, and they did.

It has been noted before in this space that Charles does not admit to liking pork, and along the way he and Leina had this discussion, which turned into an argument, which resulted in Leina calling to see if there were going to be non-pork alternatives, against Charles' wishes. But Charles hung up her phone mid-call, though not before she got the message across. So Erica and Tony made a quick pasta dish. Improbably, Leina brought green beans again.

They also brought a Just Desserts cake and some sort of dip for the beans. Tony also made squash with apple cider glaze and brussel sprouts with walnut oil. As they ate, Tony informed Leina that besides salt and pepper, there were only three ingredients in the meal (which was wrong, unless you count butter and oil as the same ingredient). He had Leina guess them. She got the pork right, but then guessed vinegar before being shocked that milk was an ingredient.

Charles had seconds of the pork.

Afterwards, Erica made tea and Leina had to listen to Tony narrate his entire four days in Japan with photos. She feigned interest.

At 11:00, Tony essentially kicked them out, so that he could go to bed. Erica thought it was rude and it probably was.

She like?

Leina, like many hip people of a certain age, was excited to go see Borat on opening day. Charles, too, was eager. So they went to Leina's favorite theater (because of the location, of course), Kabuki in Japantown, to see it. But alas, it was not to be. There was a hella long line and the movie sold out before they reached the front of it! Next time, she's buying her tickets online first. So instead, they saw A Good Year, a movie directed by the guy who did Alien and Blade Runner, about some boring English Russell Crowe who goes to France and restores a house and then restores his personality (a bit) and then falls in love. It was okay.

Is Leina so Japanese or is Japan so Leina?

This is, honest to God, the first thing Tony saw after walking through customs at Tokyo Airport.

Leina's Japaneseness

Have no fear, Leina's life has not ceased to be interesting or recorded, it is just that her blogographer was busy doing some research by visiting Japan for a few days.

Noted: In the Tokyo home were Tony was a guest (not a friend or relative of Leina's, gasp!) there was both a) a shelf full of Christmas Cacti, apparently lovingly tended, and b) two glass-doored hutch-things full of a wide variety of teacups and saucers, enough to serve roasted green tea on a different pattern every day for at least three weeks.

Until he sadly passed away, her father maintained a nice collection of a), though Leina's brown thumb has managed to kill off almost the entire collection since (though she wisely gave one to Tony and Erica to nurture before doing so).

Those who have been to Leina's house are perhaps are familiar with the presence of b), though for the record, Tony's host did not serve him using the least expensive or nice teacups, which is generally the case at Leina's.