Update? Yes, a Photo Update!
July 8th, 2009 yoshers
Blah, no updates for 8 months? Sounds like par for the course. Well, here are a bunch of photos for your enjoyment.
Enjoy!
Enter the chaotic world of Kevin Chan (aka Yoshi, Chanman and Jesus)
Pictures, Pictures, Pictures
October 23rd, 2008 yoshersPost could also be labeled as “Lazy, Lazy, Lazy”.
So, there is quite a haul of pictures.
Last Sunday, a bunch of us went to the recently reopened California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco. Although we did not go to the planetarium (long lines and Shareena apparently got motion sick in the old one…and the new one looks even more motion sick-able), we did enjoy everything else. They got Penguins, a Rainforest dome (where we witnessed a butterfly getting attacked by the fish after it somehow got stuck on the surface of the water) and an albino alligator.
Shareena and I also managed to stop by Seattle earlier this month and avoided the rain (for the most part). We stayed at the wonderful Greenlake Guest House (which was right across the street from the lake/park) and managed to hike in the Cascade mountains (and spotted a woodpecker along the way – see if you can spot it…it was pretty dark in the forest).
Here are some more pictures:
Seeing the date of the last set of photos, I really do feel lazy.
Chuhuly at the de Young
July 21st, 2008 yoshersWell, as usual, I have not updated in a while and even when there is something worthwhile to blog about (and really there have been many things that have been worthwhile to blog about), I am just too lazy, no matter how much easier it is to blog using WordPress than ever before.
Aside from my laziness, I must point out the current special exhibit at the de Young Museum – the Dale Chihuly exhibition. Shareena, of course, very astutely figured out that the same artist was responsible for the ceiling flower garden at the Bellagio. I am certainly not much of an art appreciator, certainly not someone who is wow-ed by art anyways, but the scale of these pieces of work is quite amazing.
Of course, so is the price tag on some of the pieces (very small ones in comparison) that they are selling!
Anyways, if you get a chance to see it, whether it is at the de Young or wherever (check Dale Chihuly’s web site for his exhibition schedule), it is definitely a sight to be mesmerized by.
Photos Galore – Honeymoon, Weddings and More
May 6th, 2008 yoshers
So our many adventures (including hitchhiking cockroaches and death defying bus rides) in Hong Kong and Bangkok have come to an end. I realize that doing a big update after the fact is just too exhausting (kind of like our trip) and unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), the hotels that we stayed at charged obscene prices for internet access. So other than a few side trips to very noisy internet cafes (in HK, aka – teenage gaming internet cafes), we managed to avoid the internet and working on our honeymoon.
We actually took a few more pictures than normal – partly due to my guilt of buying a new digital camera. So here are some pictures (including some old pictures from our wedding!):
Honeymoon Trip – 2008 (with an end stop in Laguna Beach for Lei and Bryan’s wedding):
More Wedding Photos (from my camera):
Other New Albums:
Honeymoon and more site changes
March 26th, 2008 yoshersAnother update accompanied by new Wordpress theme and some nifty updates. At last, with the Wordpress widgets tool and Wordpress-Gallery plugin, I now have a web site that is free of my own hacks! I am not sure if this means anything for the frequency of my updates, but it does mean that there will be more photos in my posts.
In any case, there are no photos to go with this post as I am merely pointing out that Shareena and I will be off to Bangkok and Hong Kong for our honeymoon, followed by a wedding to go to in Laguna Beach.
We are staying at:
1. HK – Harbour Plaza HK (3-9 April) – external link: http://harbour-plaza.com/ (Superior Harbourview Suite)
2. Bangkok – Davis Hotel (9-17 April) – external link: http://www.davisbangkok.net/ (Deluxe Room)
3. Laguna Beach – Casa Laguna (17-20 April) – external link: http://www.casalaguna.com/ (Courtyard Room)
Apparently the both the hotel in HK and Bangkok have rooftop pools. We will be checking those out! Many photos to follow when we return.
Wedding Photos
December 20th, 2007 yoshers
I cannot believe that I have not written in my blog since June! Oh well, I have been busy and lazy – it is quite a complicated situation. Shareena and I are still recovering from our wedding – there is wedding stuff everywhere in our house still. Hopefully, we will be able to clean this up during the winter break.
Without further adu, the photos:
There are nearly 1,000 photos in all, so take your time to view them!
Wedding Date
October 16th, 2006 yoshersWedding planning is going pretty well and as such, we have a pretty firm date and reception location.
Date: Saturday, October 27, 2007 (yes, next year)
Reception Location: Tsakopoulos Library Galleria (Sacramento)
Other information to follow!
Vancouver Trip and a Big Announcement
August 14th, 2006 yoshersFirstly, a little bit about the trip to Vancouver.
We flew up to Seattle and drove up to North Vancouver, staying at Hamersley House (where filming for the L-Word took place on our last day there…which was great as the production crew paid for our last night).
We spent a lot of time in and near Downtown Vancouver, Gastown, Granville Island, English Bay (for the fireworks) and Yaletown. We also took a short side trip to Cypress Park for a hike…more on this later.
Finally, on the way back to Seattle, we stopped by Columbia Winery for Jenna’s wedding. Pictures of the gorgeous couple are in the gallery.
Also pictures of Vancouver 2006 are in the gallery as well.
And the big announcement is…Shareena and I got engaged in Vancouver! Without further ado, here is the story:
We took a short side trip on Wednesday morning (August 2nd) to Cypress Park. What was suppose to be a short, relatively easy hike turned out much tougher as they are building the 2010 Winter Olympic Freestyle slope in the same area as the beginning of the hiking trail. Therefore, Shareena and I had to basically hike straight up the skiing slope for the first part of the hike. Shorter, yes, but steeper and the trail was basically loose gravel (being used as a road for construction trucks).
We did manage to get to the top of Black Mountain and at a lookout point, we stopped and while I was getting down on my knee and fetching the ring, Shareena was getting mobbed by mosquitos! Which, as it turns out, was a good thing because when I opened the ring holding box, the ring fell out onto the ground (due to much jostling on the hike up), but Shareena did not notice this (I had to tell her later).
Anyways, she said yes and now we are a happily engaged couple.
That’s it…now the fun begins. Oh, and here are some pictures of the ring. It is a sapphire centered ring held in place by two dragon claws.
Cool Breeze in Monterey
April 2nd, 2005 yoshersShareena and I headed down to Monterey last weekend for a quick getaway for our 7th anniversary together. Please no comments on when we are getting married…
Anyways, we stayed at a very nice bed and breakfast in Monterey called Old Monterey Inn. We had a very enjoyable stay that featured great breakfasts and lots of amenities including refrigerator full of drinks to raid, lots of good cookies and the usual wine and oer dourves. We did the normal tourist stop at the Monterey Aquarium on Friday to see all the wildlife. The new jellyfish exhibit was very cool as they integrated a lot of artwork in the exhibit to complement the coolness factor of display after display of jellyfish. There were also many feedings including the kelp aquarium, otter and penguin feedings. I always like seeing the penguins and it was quite fun to watch them line up to get their fish. Apparently, penguins are like cats in that they regulate their feedings and will not overeat. None of them look too fat, so I guess none of them are exceptions to this rule like our very own Atticus.
After our trip to the underwater world, we returned to the Inn to get Shareena a massage before we headed over to Casanova Restaurant at Carmel. The food was great and I even managed to get some very fruity German Riesling that Shareena liked. The waitress seem a bit overwhelmed and the restaurant was quite crowded. The funniest thing was that when we were being seated, we were taken outside (through their patio), around the building and then, just as it appear that we were being taken out back onto the sidewalk, we turned into another room to be seated. I guess in their expansion (the restaurant has several different dining areas), they did not think about connecting the various rooms together.
On Saturday, Shareena and I went back down to Carmel to walk around the shops and to check out the beach. The really interesting thing was looking at the real estate offices and seeing 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom places going for nearly $600,000. I guess it is all about location.
After leaving Carmel, we stopped by Gilroy for some quick shopping before heading home. Thanks to having Friday off and going down to Monterey on Thursday, we were able to avoid the crowd and also have Sunday off to relax some more before being rushed back to work.
Valentine’s Day Restaurant Notes
February 13th, 2004 yoshersInstead of writing some advice for Valentine’s Day in February (I think it is more important to stay warm first in Chicago anyways), I think I would write a thought on planning your Valentine’s Day dining out experience. I know that it is probably too late for planning advice for this year’s Valentine’s Day, but remember always that Valentine’s can be very busy (especially this year as it is on a Saturday) and if you have any proficiency at cooking, then that is a very good option as well.
For some reason, when I started booking places last Wednesday, many were already completely booked. So lesson number 1 is you can never call in too early for a reservation at a restaurant. Most places don’t charge you if you cancel up to a day in advance, so really you are not losing much (as long as you remember to cancel it if you are not going! I think the place that I reserve will charge $24 if we don’t cancel a day in advance…ouch!).
If you are thinking of going to some popular, trendy restaurant, then Valentine’s is probably not the day to go. Knowing the ambiance of the restaurant is important, so either avoid the restaurant that is really loud altogether or go at some early time like 5pm and get out by the time the place gets boisterous.
Finally, if you were looking for some place new to go to for Valentine’s day, then you will have inevitably stumbled upon a couple of other restaurants that you chose not to go because of full bookings or ambiance or whatever. Remember them and go there when they are less busy (like a Monday or Tuesday night) and get really good service and avoid the crowds. Now that is more like a romantic dinner than the hectic-ness that is Valentine’s Day.
-
Random Image
