Oscars

I'm seeing a trend in that I only post entries on Sundays. I intend to get back to more regular posting, but for now, our weeks are pretty dull outside of work based on how busy we are there and the fact that our extracurricular lives revolve exclusively around food, and I've noticed I do post almost annoyingly often about food and my love for it so during the week if I were to post, it'd consist of, "Today we ate..." which can be a bit much, indeed. Ha! That said, allow me to recap a week of food. Seriously, we did eat out three times this past week - once at Genesis to watch the Indiana University versus Purdue U. college basketball game. Craig wore his Purdue gear, but all I could sport (so to speak) was a red sweater (I plan to order IU stuff prior to the start of March Madness though). IU won. It wasn't as blissful a victory as I hoped, mainly because Purdue didn't look great throughout so there wasn't a moment where it was a questionable game, really. And now the IU coach has stepped down, after scandal. Poor crew - their coaching position is somewhat of a revolving door seemingly. Anyway, Tuesday we celebrated a KB work victory with sushi at Ooki on 3rd, despite Craig's reluctance to go there. He enjoyed himself, though - we ordered in a different manner than usual and we also ate this dynamic "chocolate hockey puck", as Craig termed it, which was described exuberantly on the dessert menu as being "chocolate madness" when in actuality, it arrived in a tidy chocolate puck-shaped formation, nothing mad about it. But it tasted fantastic. I cooked Wednesday and Thursday and Friday brought glorious, gorgeous abundant amounts of snow to New York City! Snow storms mean so much less to public transportation users in terms of affecting the commute. It's not that there aren't the occasional precipitation floods in subway tunnels or what have you, but primarily getting from point A to B is not grandly affected by a storm of any kind. So instead of dreading scraping car windows, sitting in the cold seat rubbing my hands together waiting for the car to warm up, toppled by worrying about slick conditions and roughneck drivers, I trotted outside in my warm-wear and boots and kicked around in the beauty of the white haze of New York! Unfortunately, our office has no windows, so I missed a majority of the storm, but I did enjoy the 25 minutes or so I got to have while in it on our walk from apartment to train and train to office. Friday we left work early (instructed to do so by our boss because of weather) and traveled to 96th Street to drop off rented movies and to have a couple of beers before eating Indian at Tamarind. Tamarind is across the street from the high rise apartment building where we lived when we first moved to New York, the month prior to obtaining our apartment. At that time, in June 2006, we were not seasoned Indian food eaters so we never tried Tamarind. It isn't that we're pros now, by any means, but I know what I like, now, anyway. So it was our first try at Tamarind. We ordered naan bread and chicken tikka as appetizers, and when it came time for entrees to be ordered, Craig decided on a special whereas I wanted to try their vindaloo. Vindaloo is already hot - no need to crank up the heat. But for whatever reason, probably a combination of a couple of beers, some naan and some wine, I instructed our friendly waiter to kick up my vindaloo. What a mistake. Oh boy oh was it heated through! Indian spices are a very fragile and thin line to walk. Even someone of my high heat favor can find kicked up vindaloo to be inedible! Craig tried it and couldn't believe I had suggested the kitchen to work that magic on me. Meanwhile, he loved his dish. But I didn't walk away from Tamarind hungry. And I liked it alright. It isn't the best Indian I've had in town, but for a quick walk home afterwards, it's deserving of a return trip.*Yesterday we jumped on the Long Island Rail Road at Penn Station and headed to Huntington to meet up with Brian and Aubree. They were celebrating a combined weight loss via Weight Watchers by eating out at a steakhouse called Mac's, very near the Huntington train station. The above pictured is our seafood appetizer. The presentation wasn't the prettiest, but the seafood itself was delicious, including the oysters, which I gobbled up. They tasted very fishy, though. I didn't recall them tasting so fishy last time I ate them. Brian's friend Jim and his girfriend joined us, also, so it was a lot of fun. After a gigantic and steeply-priced dinner (which we all knew going into it anyway), we hit a nearby bar and Aubree and I took a million pictures. Many of them are not as flattering as I'd have hoped - it's like, in all of them someone looks triple-chinned or grossly blurry or slit-eyed or whatever, but several turned out quite cute. I tried to explain to Craig that that's why I take so many! And wait until my sophisticated camera purchase...oh, just wait.*We crashed at their place in Northport last night, and this morning Aubree made coffee and we chatted a bit and then they drove us to the Huntington Station, which boasts more frequent trains than the Northport Station. Their neighborhood is divine. I've never seen it in the light of day before, not on the drive Aubree drove, anyway. Each house is unique and gorgeous - there are harbors, and boats, and with the recent snow covering, and the winding of the roads, I felt like I was in this cozy little universe where nothing matters but being home with a cup of coffee and the Sunday paper and maybe some fresh fruit. A neighborhood like that is something I could see myself settling into one day. Immediately, I need the pulse of Manhattan. But long term, if Craig were to decide that he'd like to stick around and start a family here, perhaps an intimate little neighborhood on Long Island like Northport is what we'd target. It's too soon to say.*Tonight: the Oscars. I'm simmering some Cooking Light Texas Chili sans beans and vegetables - only cubed eye of round, jalapenos, onions, garlic, beef broth, red cooking wine, Boddington beer, chili powder, oregano and white vinegar, and it smells like a chili cook-off in here! The chili has another half hour to simmer covered followed by an hour of uncovered simmering while the Oscars begin. Then we find out if it tastes okay. Alison and Scott invited us over tonight for spaghetti and meatballs, Alison's first meatballs attempt, but Craig's got a rough cough and I don't want him to get full-blown sick. Therefore, as much as I'd like to be with friends tonight celebrating what hopefully is a big night for films we liked, we opted to stay here, and warm.*Unfortunately, here comes another Monday. More Mondays, more Tuesdays...just promise eventual delivery of another Friday and I can suffer through!