OakMonster’s Den

This was then. (No mom, just me.)

This is now. (No me, just mom).

Happy Birthday, Daddy! You look pretty good for at 65-year-old stressed out architect! ;-D

It’s an amazing feat, my dad’s life is. Growing up privileged with a General for a dad and a princess for a mom. Sent off to study abroad and came back to make a name for himself as one of the most respected architects in the country. Brought all of us up more or less unscathed and worked his butt off to keep it all that way.

And now, at the age where a lot of Americans retire and live an easy life, Daddy is still wheeling and dealing, designing beautiful landmark resorts all over Thailand…and the UAE, leading up the charge of the international tsunami memorial design competition, and taking care of my mom.

I mean, seriously. The hardest working man I’ve ever known. In all of my life, I don’t think I’ve seen dad go to bed before 1 a.m. (Given, dad’s office is pretty much a home office–it’s one of the 3 attached town homes that are our house.) And he always has a marathon sleep in on Sundays. With all the hours that he works, I never once felt abandoned by him, let’s just put it that way. He’d take us with him on his business trips. I went solo with him many times to inspect sites or surveying lands. My brothers never quite got into that, but I did.

I inherit both the late-nighter AND the marathon sleeper genes. Oh, and the early grey hair too. I did get a bit of his artistic ability but nowhere close. Sense of humor? Where do you think I get all of these clowning achievements from?

Nonetheless, I don’t think I could ever measure up to him. His hard work and creativity is inspirational. His love for us, in his own way, blows my mind.
Anyway. I’m getting all emotional here. So I’d better stop…and get back to writing a preface for dad’s tsunami memorial book right now. LOL.

Procrastination. Now, I think I get THAT from my mom. Hehe.

#1 Man Meat.

300. Complete and total meat fest for ladies and gay men everywhere. Delicious from beginning to end. Even when bloodied, decapitated, or one-eyed. Even the bad guy is hot. I mean, Rodrigo Santoro in metal chains and not much else. Let me here you say, fuck yeah!

See? The Spartans are nice and ripped and it looked believable. You know, they’re conditioned that way. It’s not the gigantic beefy juiced up muscles. I can’t stand those.

The lean muscles that looks like you didn’t spent hours at the gym but get them from doing whatever it is that you do. The seemingly effortless ripples. THAT’s the kind of muscles I like on my men.

The rest of the movie? The action was fine. Whatever. It gets old after a while. And it dragged here and there. But I must commend the action sequence when King Leonidas, the super tasty Gerald Butler…well, not as yummy as when he was in Tomb Raider II, charged the Persian army for the first time. That scene was super neat. Too damn long a sequence, but neat. Another point that almost redeems the movie for me is a spoiler. Highlight the next paragraph to see what I say:

I don’t know about your theater, but mine exploded into applause–and a few woohoo–when the Queen grabbed the sword and stabbed that mother fucking Senator. Oh, how the ladies in the theater rejoice in that victory!

#2 St. Patrick’s Day Impromptu Party

And then there was St. Patty’s at home which I blogged while alcoholized. A mere dinner for 6 turned into a full blown party of 10. I was lucky to have enough food, booze, and dessert to feed everyone who turned up! It was fun quoting Princess Bride while drunk, by the way.

We played Scrabbles and then later used those tiles for poker chips in a never ending game of poker. As in, “Oh hey look I’m out of chips”. “Here, have some of mine.” “Sweet!”

#3 Recovery Sunday

Sunday I slept in. Essentially the same gang minus Erik went to lunch with even more people at Chen’s. At $11 each total we stuffed ourselves silly and for those of us who happened to crave grease the morning after got our wishes.

Now that you mentioned it, I still have the same headache since I woke up on Sunday. I thought it was a hangover, but after loads of water, an afternoon nap, and a full good night sleep, it just hadn’t really completely gone away.

When I had time to think about it, I felt that little alien hatching in my brain, slowly eating my right eyeball from inside out. Speaking of which…here it goes again.
Anyways. It’s been a fantastic weekend.

Much fun. Well alcoholized. One beer. 2 Irish Car Bombs.  And much more of that nice and spiked Bailey’s Irish Cream dip/frosting.  Loads of food to feed more surprise guests than late night talk show! I had 8 guests total and the giant vat of beef stew did not budge. I still have about 4 servings leftover.

1/2 lb. of stew beef per person my ass. 1/4 is fucking plenty.

And yes, I am blogging highly buzzed. Nobody wants me to take a picture for my blog so this one will be one of those SUPER fun nights that came and went without any evidence except for what’s in our memory.

I’m nice and alcoholized…oh hey, Lupe was just here to get her purse she left behind. THAT is just how much fun we had. Well, Lupe fell asleep the moment she was done with her stew so…
Our best success? With and 11-year-old on the premise, we managed to keep things MOSTLY PG-13 with occasional foul language. With that much alcohol flowing, at one point or the other someone fucks up keeping thing clean.

And I swapped my shamrocks ears for Goofy Viking hat. Brandon shook his head and me and walked away. LOL.

Will recap the whole evening tomorrow. Right now I should either go to sleep or drink some more. Muwahhaahahahahha.

Click here for more pictures from work

Any holiday–real or completely made up–that is fun, I’m all over it.

St. Patrick’s Day, obviously, is no exception.

We had fantastic time at work on St. Patty’s Eve yesterday. We had a good amount of treats going on and the company bought some corned beef sandwiches to be shared. Unfortunately, this is smack dab in the middle of lent so the Catholic population of the office could only longingly stare at the tray of Irish meat.

Canadian Greg: Those aren’t really meat. I mean, they’re the rare Gnome Corned Beef Fish of the Northern Ireland Coast. So, go on. Have some “fish”.

Nice.

I almost pinched Canadian Greg when I walked by his office in the morning. He had his back to me and his shirt was white. I got my “pinchers” out. “Greg! Where’s your green!?”.

“Right here!” He turned around to face me. He was wearing a green t-shirt underneath the button down. Sneaky bastard!

Yeap. We were on green patrol yesterday. My girls and I were pinching anyone in the office who didn’t wear green. I even chased one down the hallway. LOL.

Later, I ran into our CEO in the mail room.

Me: Ahha! No green! *The pinchers came out*

CEO: Not so fast! *Holds up his green pencils* My assistant sent me off to this meeting with these just in case I run into you.

Aw. Psych! LOL.

More fun continues tonight as I shall whip up a vat of Guinness Stout Beef Stew I’ve made on St. Patty’s for the past 5 years. It’s now a tradition.

Shane, Pop, and Serena are coming over. So is Big Erik. James and Aurora may swing by. So may Celeste. On the menu is the stew, served with crusty bread. For dessert, it’ll be Giada’s almond cupcake frosted with Bailey’s Irish Cream frosting. (Essentially, the Fruit Dip I made for work yesterday.) I will blog about the food over at Hmm…Food…Good later.

Have a safe and FANTASTI-IRISH St. Patrick’s Day, everyone!

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Originally uploaded by theoakmonster.

Tigger totally is!

Hooray for St. Patrick’s Day!

Olaina got me curious. So, I listed a few used books to sell on Amazon.com. So far, one person bought my copy of “Son of A Witch”. Worst book I’ve read recently–not that I’ve read that many. Sorry, Customer Dude!

I got so excited about this selling stuff. I didn’t only buy the padded envelopes needed for the venture, but I created the brand for my store, completed with logo shipping labels and “Hey, remember to give me feedback” cards to insert into the book.

I sold one book and I branded the whole fucking operation.

Only me, right? Only me can do that.

Well, look at the Siamese Pixie Store! I thought it would be fun to have some t-shirts printed online and the next thing you know I have a whole line of slogans PLUS a store name and brand. And now, it’s for charity.

Pssst. Hey. You. Yeah, you. Thai Redcross is counting on YOU! I haven’t made any money since the end of last year. Come on. Buy some stuff.

Unfortunately, my ability at naming the operation only happens when the mood is right. If I’m not in the mood, it could be days and months before I can come up with anything remotely useful.

I mean, I doled on one great name for my family’s new venture back in Thailand. The only issue was not the title but how Thai people would butcher the word or what they would call it instead of what we intend it to be. For example, “Central Department Store” sounds pretty straight forward in English but when Thai people say it, “Central” becomes “Sen-Taan”. Lost in translation there a little bit.

Since my one kick ass title, I completely am blocked. *sigh*

Signs that this week is not going well for me in polite society.

#1

Monday early morning, I was on the phone with Brandon at work. Eva had just got to the office. The night before, Brandon told me about geocaching–essentially a treasure/scavenger hunt of sort, utilizing a hand held GPS device–that his colleague has been doing and wanting to get us involved in.

Brandon: So the Colleague said you and her can go out this weekend if you want to.

Me: What? Me going out with the Colleague? Honey, are you dealing me out as your bitch?

And just as I said, “…dealing me out as…”, I spun my chair around to see Eva walking in with someone…

“…your bitch?”

The sentence ended just as Eva pointed the New Big Boss to my cubicle…

“And this is Oakley.”

Um. Doh?

#2

It was 8:35 a.m. I called James to wish him happy birthday.

James: [Groggily] What’s up, Oaks?

Me: [Sing “Happy Birthday” song.]

James: Hehe. Thanks.

Me: Did I wake you up?

James: Yeah. I usually don’t get up until 9.

Me: Oh, shit. Sorry! I thought you still have the normal people work hour. (James is a consultant.) Oh, man. I’m so sorry! I just didn’t want to miss your birthday like I missed Paul yesterday.

James: [Laughs] It’s okay. Thank you very much.

I hung up and wandered off for a bit. I came back to a message on my cellphone.

James: Hey, Oakley. It’s James. You didn’t miss Paul’s birthday. My birthday is the 14th. Today is the 13th. But thanks anyway!

Um. Doh! I thought today was the 14th.

Whoops.

So, after that, I called Paul’s cell phone and sang happy birthday on his voicemail, explaining how I woke James up instead of Paul but now I know I wasn’t late to sing him his birthday song. So there.

At least, Paul didn’t pick up the phone…so I don’t know if I woke him up or not.

#3

Late in the afternoon, Bob walked by our corner looking a little bit tired.

Eva: Bob! What’s wrong? You look like you’re a…um…[seeking for word]…you’re Thriller.

Bob/Me/Celeste: What??

Eva: You know. He looks all slow and weird…like in Thriller.

Bob: Thriller?

Me: Oh, come on, Eva! Bob doesn’t look like the undead in Thriller. Because if he was, he’d be doing THIS…

I busted a few moves in the office…as many as I could remember…and that didn’t include too much of MJ’s famous pelvic thrusts. I used to be able to do the whole opening sequence when I was a kid. dammit! I think it’s time to brush up.

Come on, everybody. It’s thriller night!

We finally are having a real weekend over here! Totally making up for the madness that was the Auntie-filled Vegas weekend.

First of all, the work gang didn’t get to Shabu Shabu at Little Tokyo as planned. Even arriving a good 15 minutes before the joint opens, we were already in the 2nd round of seating! Although, we did learn that if we were to take a late lunch at 1 p.m., our chance of actually getting to have shabu would be better than trying to arrive early. So we mozied over to T.O.T. Fantastic rice-and-noodle bowl place. Hip…yet so traditional!

Friday night, I went over to Brenda’s to drop off the Yuzu juice, a Japanese citrus fruit juice, I picked up for her from J-Town. The plan to just exchange the juice for a hunk of steak Brenda picked up for me from Plowboy turned into an hour of visit over a glass of wine. LOL. It’s been a long time since I solo hang out with Bren…and the first time with Jon too.

I haven’t hung out with Brenda alone in what seems like a million years. But now that I’m starting to cook, there is a common language there for us that could go on forever. Brenda is a teacher in profession, so she is more than happy to give me guidance on my journey down the foodie adventure.

And hence, I walked away with baggies of spices Brenda recently order in bulk. And yes, she gave me a baggy full of what I should be using instead of Herbes de Provance. Just add lavender, which she also gave me, and voila! (No more bastardized HdP!) She also handed me the Alton Brown’s method of cooking steak so that I wouldn’t accidentally repeat the roast beef disaster a few nights ago.

Steak is one thing I had down somewhat. But it’s good to learn yet another fool-proof method. I did redeem myself.

(And yes, I will probably repost this bit on Hmm…Food…Good. Heh.)

Saturday was packed. Yet, it was a fun errand day. A bit of running and chatting with Shane turned out to be a perfect way to start the day. Then it was lunch with Brandon all the way down in Santa Ana. When you crave Pat & Oscar’s bread sticks and house Italian dressing, nothing else would satiate.

We then ran errands around the Main Place Mall. Party supply. Bookstore. Hot Topic. See’s Candies. (And we walked when the fresh free sample of caramel and marshmallow just came out. O. M. F. G!!!! It was just so damn good!) Gas and a car wash for Merlin, my blue Corolla.

After a few minutes rest at home, off took off by myself to to recycle our bottles and cans, drop off dry cleaning, a personal care appointment, Trader Joe’s, Borders, Sears, Hallmark, Bristol Farms, and finally the local Vons. I made dinner and we watched Stranger Than Fiction. A great movie, by the way. Will Farrell amazes both of us. Then it was a long string of Tivo’ed shows: Battlestar Galatica, The Black Donnellys, Mythbuster, and BBC Robin Hood…which we agreed suck major ass.

And today? I woke up first and hauled all of laundry to the laundromat to get all 5 loads done at once. We lunched on scrambled eggs with bad sausages I had to throw out. I put my old books up for sale on Amazon. And now, I probably would get in the kitchen to make dinner in a few hours.

Brandon suggested that we go out today, being the first day after we sprang forward. Any other day I would jump to the chance. But strangely, I wanted to just be home for the rest of the evening.

Gee. I wonder why that is. LOL.

In an Italian yogurt store in Little Tokyo, Celeste peered over the topping counter.

Celeste: Excuse me. What is THAT?

Yogurt Guy: That’s red beans.

Celeste made a face.

Me: Sweetened red beans. It’s a Japanese dessert.

Celeste: Well, I don’t want no frijoles (Spanish for beans) in MY yogurt.