Leina's Life (by Tony): December 2006

Thursday, December 21, 2006

One year anniversary

On Tuesday, Leina forgot to celebrate. Celebrate what? Some anniversary with Charles? somebody else's birthday? The holiday season? No, it was one year ago today that Leina's Life began. Its beginnings were humble, but there have been some good times over the year. The few loyal readers have even, at times, been entertained. One even has been lobbying for a best-of contest. So as a reader suggestion, I am hereby happy to hear nominations of the best-of 2006 in Leina's life.

But Leina did celebrate Tuesday. Just the wrong thing! It was Jun's birthday, and an ice cream cake was in order. Surprising no one, Leina was nominated to bring the cake. Burlingame is not super close to Leina's house, and she was concerned that the cake might melt in car on the way there. So she planned ahead, phoned ahead to some ice cream cake purveyor in Burlingame, and picked it up less than a mile from Noriko's house. She was roundly applauded for her ingenuity.

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Photo concerns



Today Leina decided to send out some photos from Carlito's birthday. They were not particularly interesting, just four photos, two of the cake and two of the birthday boy. She sent the photos out to Tony, Erica, and Erica's dad's work email. Moments later, she panicked. Perhaps she had sent them not only the four intended photos, but also those other photos! Those photos she didn't want anyone else to see! Maybe they were photos of her in her bikini in a compromising position with Charles in Hawaii, but it is unknown exactly what they were of. Oh, the embarrassment! A few close friends almost accidentally saw this! She quickly called Tony and Erica, who were at the moment hosting Mandara for dinner and drinks, and made them run to check their email. No compromising photos were viewed, Leina's integrity was not compromised.

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Party Time

Last night Leina found herself at Element, again. Element had not been a factor in Leina's life for almost a whole year. Last November, Leina had bailed on Stephen Dodson's birthday, which Stephen Dodson was also guilty of. In February, Leina had celebrated her birthday there. But she had not been back since. A casual observer perhaps would have decided that Leina had gotten tired of the joint on Geary Street, that she had moved on.

Maybe Leina had moved on, but Aptos Posse had not. It was Jennifer Garcia's birthday, and she and her posse were determined to party hard. It was decided that this hard partying would occur at Element, and Leina, not being an actual member of the Aptos Posse, had no voice in the decision.

Before the club was dinner, at Amici's. Leina had a stiff margarita and some enchaladas. Or she would have had this been a Mexican Restaurant. Instead she had some pizza or pasta and shared some wine with her tablemates. No grappa was consumed. She made Charles come with, and they ate well, and danced some at Element. There was no Boyz II men nor ABC or BBD to dance to, so she was sad. She did manage to Get her Freak On to Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliot, so the night was not lost. After Element, there were some plans to have a sundae, but Leina and Charles bailed and went to sleep.

The next morning, for some reason they drove over to Noe Valley and waited in line to go to Chloe's for brunch. It was fine. She didn't even consider the corned beef hash, deciding upon eggs Benedict, after the Revolutionary War traitor.

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Mandarins


Leina doesn't like clementines (shown below). She likes satsumas (shown above). She says that clementines are hard to peel, which leads one to wonder if she had ever eaten a clementine.
She might be in trouble, though, as it seems the former are surpassing the latter in popularity.

Saturday, December 09, 2006

Out of Contact

Hawaii is a part of the United States, and is even covered in Cingular's network without roaming fees added. Yet Leina, while there, believes that she should not call back her friends until almost a week has passed. Then she calls Erica in the middle of a Raconteurs' concert, and they chat. Erica learned that Leina subsisted on frozen pizza for her last few days in the Lower 48. And that Leina'll be back on the continent on Monday. No word on how the dried shrimp went over, though.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Omiyagi

Today Leina is delivering omiyagi to all the aunties and uncles. Every time she visits, of course she needs to bring gifts. And not just to those who host her or take her out; she need to give gifts to everyone. These are apparently called omiyagi in Japanese. Unfortunately, it is not so simple deciding what gift to bring everyone.

She fretted about what to bring this year. She wanted to bring food, but all these aunties and uncles are old and have all these dietary restrictions. Can't be too sweet, can't be too salty, can't be too fatty. Someone even said, "No nuts."

Leina was initially excited to bring persimmons for everyone, but Hawaii has imported vegetable restrictions, or so she claims (half-hearted attempts to confirm this were unsuccessful). She says that if a fruit has a stem or leaf, then they won't let it in without special permits. So she contemplated removing the stems and leafs from the persimmons and hoping Ag Control would be okay with that.

Last time, she was mildly successful with shitake mushrooms, but she can't bring them again. Another time, she brought Chinese beef jerky. The Chinese jerky, for those who are not familiar with it, is not only salty like typical jerky, but also cloyingly sweet. So that will never make an encore appearance.

Then she thought of dried fruit, but that didn't pass the dietary restrictions--too sugary. She was really at a loss for what to bring them. So she called up a few of the aunties looking for advice. One said she'd like some of those tiny dried shrimp, which can be a tasty to a fish or seaweed broth. Another one said, "Anything you bring me is just fine," but Leina knew she was lying. So she brought the dried shrimp.

Monday, December 04, 2006

The 50th State

Leina has been out of the news for the past few days because she is in the middle of the Pacific in our most exotic state, Hawaii. Before getting all worked up about the extravagant vacation Leina has taken so early into her social working career, please be informed that the purpose of this trip is business, not pleasure.

Leina does a better job of explaining it, but her father passed away two years ago, and there is a Buddhist ceremony one year after a death and then another one two years after the death. And a few more after that. And they all have to be in close proximity to good surfing. Maybe not that last part; Leina has lots of relatives in Hawaii, and maybe even little nephews who she can drive to sleep. But when she's not doing that, she will likely be participating in the highly organized Japanese Buddhist rituals that go with one's death.