Other stuff I have recently come across and liked:

Crepes du Nord This place is the best lunch place ever if you work in the financial district. Shockingly, they serve crepes.

Del Posto Don took us here to celebrate a deal closing and it was amazing. It’s Mario Batali (he does great pasta), we had a five-course meal plus a lot of wine and cocktails. I went with my sister to Babo a while back, which is also Batali, but I thought this place was better. They had this cucumber-flavored gin drink slash concoction that I cannot even describe, but I miss it dearly. You know it’s a nice place when they give you complementary boxes of truffles when you leave. Well, that and the 4-figure bill. Anyway, I was impressed.

Dropbox I’ve been using this for a while now, but I finally upgraded to the paid version because it’s so useful. Simply stated, it’s cloud computing, which basically means that your files are saved on a server somewhere, so it’s accessible anywhere. I tried a number of these types of solutions, but Dropbox was by far the best. It basically syncs all the documents in one folder on each of the computers you link to your account, and it stores the files online in their server as well, so all your stuff is accessible through any web browser as well. It’s great because it’s simple, and it does performs a few functions incredibly seamlessly and correctly. If you have multiple computers you work from, or you just like having access to the contents of your hard drive from anywhere (they have an Android app, so I can get to basically all of my files using my cell phone, too), it’s an incredibly useful application.

Crazy Heart I didn’t think I would like this movie, but I did. It’s nothing fancy, but I liked it.

Justin Bieber I love him. Nah, I’m just kidding, he sucks. Sorry to those with Bieber Fever.

So, I thought it was amazing. I actually managed to cry in this movie during the final action sequence, which is bizarre, both because it’s an action sequence and because I tend not to get very emotional when it comes to sci-fi flicks.

While I am neither a sci-fi person nor a fx junkie, anyone who likes science fiction and special effects stuff should, without a doubt, see it. In 3D. The world that they’ve created in this movie is just so intricate and well-thought out that anyone who is even remotely interested in it should go just for that experience. And I loved that it was in 3D – it made everything seem much more immersive – even though I was originally extremely skeptical and for the first 15 minutes or so my eyes had difficulty adjusting (it’s hard to know what to focus on visually at first, but eventally it’ll stop seeming that way), so, I could see how if you don’t have the patience with that sort of thing, you might want to avoid it.

As for anyone else, I’d say the action component is solid — it is pretty non-stop, so this is not a movie where you’ll be likely to feel “bored”. There’s romance, drama, solid acting, etc. The plot line I thought was good, but it bears some obvious resemblances to a Sci-Fi rendition of Pocahontas when it first starts, and it’s more or less what you’d expect. And yeah, the movie takes itself a wee bit seriously. All in all, yes, you could find things to dislike or criticize about it, but there’s so many good things about it and it’s so well made that, for most people, it’s worth the cost of admission to give it a shot.

Oh, also, I watched Julie and Julia with Amy, which was fortunate because the charater/real person Julie Powell lives along the water in Queens, which is where Amy lives, and a lot of the shots in the movie were the views that we had from Amy’s apartment, haha. Pepsi-Cola!

I did a little bit of the things I said I would do – LSATs, sleep, getting together with people, etc. I didn’t make as much progress on the LSATs as I hoped. I still think I could do better on the logic games if I studied some more — it just takes me too long to chart out those problems right now. I want to get to the point where charting them out is second nature. I think I’m okay on the rest.

I’m surprised how many people I ended up seeing over break. It seems Marie, Sid and Nita (who I did not see) are all planning on law school as well. A bunch of people are doing i-banking or finance-related jobs: Hemal, Bo, etc. Lots of med-schoolers. Also, I finally, finally saw all the Yalies, who have been alluding all of us for the past few years. We had an awkward New Years’ party at Khang’s house — we ended up washing champagne glasses as it hit midnight because they were too dusty to toast with, haha. Also, for future reference, twist-off champagne bottles don’t “pop,” regardless of what the warning on the bottle may say.

We also managed to get in some ice skating, even if Jules, Kasey and Bo were two hours late. Yeah, thanks. Seven minutes my butt, Jules. Haha. Howie and Karen came, too. Ann and Aaron showed up together (but not “together”), but Aaron was unwilling to skate because he is a scaredy-cat. You may tell him I said that because I never got invited to that LAN party to play Diablo 2. I’m very upset. I also had a weird night out with the boys — I attempted to get into the wrong person’s car (v. awkward) and we went to a place that played explicit music videos from the late 80′s and early 90′s. Very weird, but I met Sid’s cousin. Cool.

What else…I ended up going to three movies over break. First, Enchanted with Marie, where I missed the first hour because I went to the wrong movie theater, proving, unequivocally, that I am indeed a genius. Second, Enchanted (again!) with Tina, Amy and Jeanne, wherein I finally got to see the full movie. Finally, I saw Charlie Wilson’s War with Daniel and Aaron. I would say both movies were slightly better than mediocre, but whatever.

Recently Read Stuff:

Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follet; I actually really liked this book. I’ve been in a historical fiction and mystery phase recently. (Obviously, this falls in the first category.) It was probably the lengthiest book that I’ve read continuously. Usually, I get bored at some points in more “epic” novels. It got a little overwrought with drama at some points, but I guess that’s to be expected from a former writer of horror/thrillers. Oh, it’s about building a cathedral.

The Dante Club, by Matthew Pearl; I have a feeling (however potentially unfounded) that things that are described to be facts in this book give way to much more entertaining fictions, but it’s about a group of Dante translators who discover that a murderer is going around killing off sinners in a Dantesque fashion. However, this is set at a time when Dante is relatively unknown and still only in Italian so the murder must be among their ranks. Drama ensues.

Freddy and Fredericka, by Mark Helprin; I enjoyed this, but I honestly can’t think of a single person I’d recommend it to. It’s about a royal couple who – for various reasons – get sent, penniless and with only one another, to make their own way in America. It’s a little more bizarre than I’d expected, but if you’re willing to suspend reality, you’ll probably find yourself rooting for the two main characters. One caveat, it’s a little condescending when it comes to making assumptions about the perceptions of the “common people” but whatever.

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie; Good. Someone gets stabbed in the back. House full of people — whodunit?

The Clocks by Agatha Christie; Also good. A a stranger finds a dead body in house surrounded by clocks set to the wrong time. Hercule Poirot comes to the rescue.

Shopaholic & Baby by Sophie Kinsella; Actually pretty entertaining. I thought her previous Shopaholic book (the & Sister one) kind of … was not great. Anyway, this one was more like the previous ones, thank goodness. Basically, our Becky has a baby, but suspects that Luke is stepping out with her doctor. It’s good, clean fun.

Other Stuff:

I booked tickets to London! Whoo hoo!

Anyway, as such, my return from Taiwan has been marked with an extended interest in Jay Chou. What follows is the obvious: download his music, watch his music videos, pour over lyrics desperately trying to decode what the hell he’s saying (seriously, can this guy mumble any more? I didn’t think so), and finally watch his movies. So, I watched Secret, which he directed, which I thought was pretty damn good for a first effort. It was cute, I think.

(Now it gets ugly.) Last week, I followed up my Jay Chou movie viewing plans by watching Curse of the Golden Flower — holy crap. Okay, I remember when Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon came out I thought it was an overrated movie that people were afraid to say was bad. Afterall, maybe they didn’t like it because they didn’t “get” it or because it’s a translation/foreign film/aren’t artsy films always a little weird? — e.g. it’s easier to give the movie the benefit of the doubt than to seem like an uncultured bigot, right? Yeah, so, Curse of the Golden Flower is so much worse.

Soooo much worse. I can’t believe how bad it was. I want to assume that people said they liked it for the reasons I stated above for Crouching Tiger, but honestly, you’d have to be a little stupid not to see how bad it was. It was just one plot turn after another that led up to bullshit. The most gruesome thing about it (other than the tens of thousands of dead corpses in the movie, of course) was seeing how much money had clearly gone into this terrible film. What a waste of stuff. Clearly an example of when liquidation value would’ve been higher than the “asset” they produced.

I don’t really have a point I’m trying to reach here. I just thought it needed to be said how bad this movie was.

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Anyway, other than purchasing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at my handy-dandy Barnes and Noble across the street and going to Pinkberry, I don’t have much else I wanted to do in New York. I even went to a Yankees game the other week! It was Old Timers’ Day so that was interesting in a kind of realizing-your-own-mortality kind of way. It was odd to see all these people who are supposed to be such legends but are now struggling to run across the field. We had fun, but honestly, it was more due to the cracker jacks, peanuts and dippin’ dots (which came in a cool Yankee cap/cup thing. Fun!). Here’s a shot of the stadium:

Oh, and my roommate and I went to this little movie theater called the Ziegfeld Theater to watch Ratatouille. The movie itself was really cute, the theater was an experience in itself. I can’t imagine seeing one of those in Plano – it was decorated like an old-style theater with lots of velvet and red draped curtains. The guy directing you to the theater had a really deep movie-fone voice, and they only had one screen and played one movie at a time. The whole thing was decorated beautifully and ornately, and when the movie started, the curtains parted, etc. Loved the whole experience.

Actually, one caveat, I really wanted to do Shakespeare in the Park, but I never really found anyone else who wanted to do it and didn’t want to go by myself. (And now it’s closed until August.) Ahhh, well. I guess I’ll just have to come back some day.

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Anyway, I just wanted to do a quick post before tomorrow since I don’t know how busy I’ll be from then on because I’m going to New York tomorrow! Basically, after leaving Los Angeles, I flew back to Texas with my family. A couple days later my sister swung by and I went with her and her friends, Sean and Ivan, to Houston. We all stayed with her and her roommate in their apartment. We all slept in her room, but Sean got the bed because no one wanted to sleep with him. Ha ha.

The day before they left we went downtown to a club at night and accidentally parked in some office building because their gate stayed open too long and we thought it was paid parking. It was a fiasco. The club was interesting — it was all Asians and they had a live band playing, like, 80′s and 90′s music, but then all the Asians looked confused and were just standing around with these “Where’s the techno?” looks on their faces.

Iris and I watched Borat, which has been long overdue, especially because my Communication Law professor this semester, Joe Beck, actually represents Borat. It was funny. We made smoothies from scratch and lemon muffins from a Williams Sonoma mix. Delish. If you like smoothies, here’s a tried and true smoothie recipe I’ve used tons of times that has never let me down:

Ingredients

• One and a half (1 1/2) cups, or eight ounces, of blueberries
• One (1) cup of orange juice
• Half (1/2) cup of plain, low-fat yogurt
• Half (1/2) cup of ice

Instructions

Put in blender. Mix. Drink. (It’s a little thick, so, add more water or OJ as needed.)

I’m somewhat apprehensive about New York just because I feel so all over the place and unsettled right now. Hopefully the three days before the internship starts will be enough time to get my mind focused (and perhaps to pick up a new pair of shoes? Maybe?) so I can concentrate. Wish me luck!

Anyway, my roommates are an orderly pair, which is great, but sometimes it gets to be a bit much so I went on a cleaning strike the day they left. It went pretty well until I realized that I, too, do not enjoy living in flith, and earlier today I started cleaning, and cleaning, and cleaning … and now the apartment is cleaner than before they left. What can I say, I am weak. And, I remember why I like my roommates.

At any rate, I’ll be sort of having my own mini-vacation next month anyway. I’m leaving on the 11th for Washington D.C. because of Georgetown’s Business Strategy Challenge, which is a student-run undergraduate case competition, where I’m going to (along with three other Goizueta kids) be representing Team Goizueta. I’ve never done a case competition before so I’m sure this will be a bit embarrassing. However, the whole thing is run by a bunch of undergrads so I’m guessing it’ll be a little to rag-tag too take all that seriously anyway.

After that, in May, I’ll be off to California for my cousin’s wedding, which will be on the 14th, which means I’ll have to miss graduation. That makes me a little sad, but … whatever. Then it’s off to NYC and maybe Taiwan right before school starts up again.

Long story short, I’m going to be jet-setting around a lot so I’m not too sad about staying in Atlanta for Spring Break. Also, I hate plane flights. And I’ve actually had a pretty good time here so far. When I got out of the movie theater after watching 300 on Saturday, the police had surrounded the building because right past the parking lot was a field where (an) armed robber(s) had escaped into. According to an officer we asked later, they caught the guys, but not before we sat around in the parking lot watching the helicopter fly around and seeing the police do their thing. Fun stuff.

300, by the way, was great.

Anyway, afterwards we all went to the Majestic, which is this diner that Dave is obsessed with. It was, however, actually quite good. I’ll try to get a picture of it next time cause you have to see it to understand.

Oh, and one of the IT monkeys at work introduced me to a new game called Plasma Pong which seems a little too addicting for me to install on my computer right now. Nevertheless, during the next break…maybe. It’s like pong, except you can shoot out or suck in plasma with your paddle, and the game has a pretty impressive rendering engine for the plasma for any of those die-hard dorks out there.

In other news, I watched one of the most depressing movies ever. I was looking for a fluffy Korean drama-ish type movie. You know, just some silly characters in some ridiculously cheesy setup. Anyhow, I ended up watching Sad Movie (yes, I do realize that perhaps the title should have tipped me off, but try to work with me here), which stars Tae-hyun Cha (My Sassy Girl). I mean, the description I got from IMDB just said it was about some people struggling with their relationships.

Anyhow, it turned out to be like a Love Actually from hell. There were 4 pairs of people, each with a different type of relationship. Except, whereas in Love Actually everyone had issues, worked through them and then was happy, in Sad Movie, they all have issues, work through them and then miserable things happen to everyone! So depressing! Anyhow, the moral of this story is: Sometimes, things are more obvious than you would think. Lesson learned.

Anyway, Karen turned 21 as of today. We had a late dinner at Bennigan’s so she could order a drink when it struck twelve. So, happy birthday to her. I finally, finally, finally got to hang with Amy, Daniel and Howie this week. Yay! And we saw Gloria, Yelena, Julie … point being, it’s been really great hearing about how everyone’s doing at college. Ron’s graduating this year, which is just weird.

After the um…”IB INVASION” as I chose to name it because I am a dork, we went to Taco Diner. Contrary to what the name might suggest (clearly a poor marketing decision), it’s actually a nice restaurant. I had an overpriced Tilapia fillet which led to the name of this post. Well, that and all the people I won’t see for another year or two (boo). Kasey left this past weekend and Thomas is leaving tomorrow. Sigh. So long, all.

Anyway, I watched The Prestige and the The Illusionist at the dollar theater recently. (Oh! The dollar theater, better known as Movies 10, is no longer the dollar theater but rather the dollar-fifty theater. I’m distraught, but that’s another subject for later.) The Illusionist is a movie about magicians and the art of creating an illusion. The Prestige is what The Illusionist would have been if it were a good movie. The Prestige, great. The Illusionist, not so much. It was disappointing because I really like Ed Norton (The Illusionist, American History X). But The Prestige was clearly conceived, had solid acting throughout, had character development, and all that other good stuff (plus Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman). The Illusionist was badly edited, executed its ending poorly, and the production quality was just worse overall. My point is, if you’re trying to choose between the two, go with The Prestige. It’s much better.

But I mentioned something about grapes. So here goes, two more recipes for the cookbook. The first is for a full on Waldorf salad (which is basically an enhanced fruit salad), which my sister and I made while I was in Austin. The second is just a snack, Spiced Grapes, which is like a watered down version of the first item.

• Two (2) cups of apples, diced (roughly 3 or 4 apples, Gala or Fuji apples are best so skip those standard “Red Delicious” apples)
• One (1) cup of seedless grapes, halved
• Half (1/2) cup of celery, chopped
• Quarter (1/4) cup of walnuts or pecans
• Quarter (1/4) cup of raisins or dried cranberries
• Quarter (1/4) cup of mayonnaise
• 8 oz. of low-fat vanilla yogurt
• One (1) tablespoon of fresh-squeezed lemon juice
• Half (1/2) tablespoon of ground cinnamon

Instructions

Most of these items, you can add or subtract as you see fit. Basically, just combine the mayonnaise and yogurt in a bowl. Bake the walnuts/pecans until golden brown (usually 5-10 minutes, just put them on some foil on a baking pan) in the oven. After that, just combine and fold the ingredients in. Voila!

The Waldorf makes for a very easy, but still delicious and relatively healthy side dish. However, if that’s still too complicated for you, Spiced Grapes are a good alternative (assuming you don’t have some intense hatred of grapes). Just wash some grapes, plop on some vanilla yogurt, add a dash of cinnamon and enjoy.