Moments in My Life

I received a set of very cute Mickey & Minnie Sandwich cutter from Ramblingmoo not too long ago and I tried it out with the Mickey cutter. I like it very much.

Above was my first two tiers simple bento.  I had some peanut butter jelly sandwich cut in Mickey and star shapes.  My son likes the star shapes as it is smaller and can be taken in one bite.  I usually have some baked Goldfish for him and some grapes too.  You see, the bento was very plain.  That time, I have not bought any food decoration/dividers to brighten it up yet.

San Francisco Day 1 Part 1

October 17th 2008

We were back on the road after an hour stopover at Solvang.  The drive up to Gilroy we passed through many grapes farms.  I am not sure if they are vineyards or just farms.  This is the longest part of our segment.  I was really hoping Brandon could hold his needs to go as long as he can.  Since he didn’t have much during our lunch, I gave him a box of Horizon Organic Chocolate Milk a little while into our drive.  He took a second nap for about an hour during this segment or our drive. 

When he woke up, we knew we had to find a spot to stop.  We were in Salinas and saw a mall by the freeway with an exit right after it.  Of course, we took that exit to stop by the Macy’s departmental store in the mall to borrow their facility.  It was about 3:40pm by now.  We hopped back into our car and towards Gilroy we went.

Alan had been bragging about this ‘garlic’ restaurant at Gilroy just across the freeway from the outlet malls that a co-worker of his told him how great this place is.  He wanted to give it a try.  I was really looking forward to it because I love garlic.  It was only 4pm when we arrived at Gilroy and it was too early for dinner.  We stopped by one section of the Gilroy Premium Outlet Mall for a little bit while waiting to pass time.  And because of that, I spent over $100 on a handbag at Coach.  My first Coach Handbag.

We filled up our car before going to the restaurant.  The gas here is more expensive than in LA.  It cost us $3.65/gal for the mid grade.  We paid $3.43/gal before we left LA this morning. 

The restaurant was on Leavesly Drive, just one block across the freeway from the outlet mall. We arrvied at 5pm. The restaurant has a Black Bear Theme thus the name Black Bear Diner.

I was expecting to enter a restaurant with a lot of garlic aroma but it has none. It is just a regular American diner unlike how Alan’s co-worker has mentioned. We looked through the menu and the only item I noticed with garlic recipe is the garlic french fries. We didn’t order it as we had french fries during lunch. Alan had meatloaf while I had pot roast petite dinner. Alan’s chose his two side dishes - mac & cheese and onion rings. My petite dinner came with the green bean caserole and mash potato.

The food filled us up well. I couldn’t even finish my plate but Alan finished his except for the mac & cheese. Brandon had very little of the mac & cheese. We had purposely order that for him as I didn’t see anything else on the menu he would like (except french fries). He is not a big fan on mac & cheese. He probably missing his rice/noodle dishes already. Lately, Brandon loves to be in front of the camera. He has learn to say ‘cheese‘ for picture. Here is one.

We drove up to the hotel after we were done with the dinner. It was around 6pm and we got there at 6:35pm. Check in was a breeze and our room was on the ground floor with the patio facing the pool and it was very near to the parking exit too.

To be continue …

We received many sales/survey calls each day. And they usually call when I was preparing the dinner. I just hate it to answer the phone when my hands were all dirty and wet. My house phone is actually not listed in the directory, supposedly. But somehow they got my numbers. Sometimes these marketing agencies will also call my cellphone which will cost me my minute if I answer and I have to answer it even though the number doesn’t look familiar because it might be someone calling enquiring about my real estate listing.

Next time I have to remember to note down the numbers and enter them at Phone Number Reporting. At this website, you can view a list of sales or marketing phone numbers provided by other people. You need to help to enter all the numbers you know that are sales or marketing based so you can help the others to avoid the calls too.