Cravings, ravings and such November 26, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Drooling & Cooking, Parenting & Motherhood , 14commentsIt has never been my practice to “eat for two” when I am pregnant, but I tend to get hungry quicker now, which (I think) is my body’s way of telling me to eat when I do. Maybe it’s because the 2nd trimester is an “eating trimester”. So what do I do? I indulge, of course….!
Cheesecake has and always will be a love of mine, and I was ecstatic when I found out that we had The Cheesecake Factory here in San Jose. Well, I was kinda bummed when I found out it was already in existence several years ago when I was here, and I missed out on having cheesecake there then, so I had been bugging my hubby to take me there this time, torturing him with my rants of pregnancy cravings and whatnot.
My chance came last Sunday when we were in the vicinity of The Cheesecake Factory, and when we finally found the shop, I promptly stepped in to get a slice of yummy cheesecake. Any one will do, I thought. But I was spoiled for choice. I could feel my saliva glands going into overtime as I glanced at the menu and finally selected a slice of Lemon Raspberry Cream Cheesecake, which was packed in a jiffy, with TWO dollops of whipped cream to boot. My hubby and I were wondering why I was given TWO servings of whipped cream instead of one. Well, the only reason I could think of was cuz I was pregnant. Tee-hee.
I am SO going back there for more the next time!
And then, the next day, lunchtime saw hubby and I enjoying a delicious bowl of phố (Vietnamese beef noodles) at Pho Nam, one of the most popular haunts for Vietnamese cuisine. Then lunch crowd is humunguous, and if we get there a little bit late, we have to wait to be seated. ALWAYS.
But don’t you think it is SO worth it? The concoction of piping hot beef broth with smooth phố, topped with basil, bean sprouts and chilli is so GOOD. We never get stuff as good as this in Malaysia, aitelyu.
My favorite is the tendon part, so I usually will choose the option that has that. We ordered the fried spring rolls too, which were served with fish sauce laced with shreds of carrot.
Very, very good indeed. It was something different from what we usually order, which is the UNFRIED and white spring rolls served with thick peanut sauce. Both types of spring rolls are so good, I wished they serve it combo style, so we could get the best of both worlds.
In any case, can you tell that I am absolutely enjoying all the food here? Well, I know for a fact that the baby in my tummy is…look at that amazing tumble-turn there! 
Guide to a good nite’s rest November 26, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Rainmakers , add a commentWe miss our king-sized mattress back home in Penang. In the US, we are provided with two beds, yes…but both the beds come with only queen-sized mattresses. With a toddler that can sleep in all forms of acrobatic manners all through the night, it is imperative that we find an alternative solution really soon. I wonder if my kid will take to sleeping on one of these cool inflatable air mattresses? Well, one thing’s for sure…he will definitely LOVE jumping on it!
When will I eat you again? November 21, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Drooling & Cooking , 15comments
Ahhhh…..YES.
One of the very first items my hubby and I bought when we first stepped into the supermarket here is the Häagen-Dazs ice cream. They come in tubs of 1 quart each. For those who are imperial-system-challenged, 1 quart is equivalent to about 2 pints. And a pint is the size we normally see in Malaysian supermarkets. In the US, they sell Häagen-Dazs ice cream in smaller sizes too, but we get the quart size cuz that’s more economical.
Anyway, 1 quart of Häagen-Dazs ice cream costs about USD6.99. Isn’t that awesome? And last weekend, we stumbled on a grocery store that was selling it at USD4.99 or something, so obviously I stocked up.
In any case, those tubs are still sitting pretty in the freezer, while I wait for my cough to recover completely. Knowing fully well my passion to always “fight fire with fire”, hubby has strictly barred me from ice cream and cold drinks till I say bye-bye to my cough. Can’t even have my favorite strawberry milkshake now….SIGH.
Oh, how I miss my ice cream!
The assam, the laksa & …? November 18, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Drooling & Cooking , 16commentsMy immense craving for assam laksa led me on a wondrous culinary adventure last Sunday. I had all the ingredients necessary and I figured it was a good tea-time treat for my hubby and I. Of course I didn’t have the *luxury* to hunt for ALL of the spices, but I made do with a little help from a *friend*, who followed me all the way from Penang:
Half an hour later, our whole apartment was reeking of that familiar tamarind-assam-like flavor and as I readied my tummy for the wondrous experience, I put the laksa noodles to boil…or rather, what I *thought* was laksa noodles when I bought it from the Asian grocer here.
It turned out to be loh-see-fun (mouse-tail noodles)! So instead of the long strands of laksa, we had short ones instead. What to do… 
Oh, and we definitely did not forget the heh-ko (prawn paste), also imported exclusively from Penang. No bowl of laksa would be complete without it!
I’m gonna have to try hunting for those laksa noodles now. That supposed teatime treat turned out to be an early dinner for me, because I couldn’t eat anything else after that.
Besides, I was still suffering from my week-long cough, and it became a tad worse last weekend because my cough was so forceful, there were traces of blood in the phlegm! Oh, it doesn’t sound as serious as it does. It’s just drier here in the States and the throat tends to be more sensitive. I’m on the doc-approved-for-preggers Robitussin DM now. Got it from Target on Sunday, and hoping that my cough-free days will come back to me soon.
In loving memory always November 17, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Close to Heart & Home , 20commentsLast Friday while I was at work, I logged in to check on my gmail account after lunch. The latest email I received was from Mom, all the way from Malaysia. It bore sad news that my Porpor had just passed away. She was 87 years old and had just celebrated her birthday about a week ago.
Reading on, I learnt that Porpor had been admitted into hospital about 9 hours before that and was in a very critical condition.
My Porpor led a beautiful life filled with joy, love and happiness, and she brought a smile to those whose lives she had touched. While I am saddened by her passing, I am ever grateful that I am blessed to have known her; to have had her care for me when I was a baby and to have her love showered upon me.
One of the last few photos I took with Porpor was during her birthday celebration last year. She was always happy to see me, and I remember that she looked very prosperous in that red outfit she was wearing.
I will miss my Porpor, but I know in my heart that her legacy lives on forever.
The bento-ing starts here… November 14, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Drooling & Cooking , 21commentsThus ends my first week at work. With me starting work and all, I figured it would be good to have packed lunches (read: bento) for my hubby when he is at work. After all, I wouldn’t have that much time to cook lunch, whether I am onsite in the office or working from home. So I modified my cooking patterns and decided to cook in the evenings for dinner and have some leftovers for lunch the next day. It required some planning of course, and also, I had to wake up a little bit early every morning to prepare the food, but I know the sacrifice would be worth the while. Besides, I try to prepare whatever I can the night before, just so I could sleep in a little bit longer.
In the US, it really makes sense to bring a bento in for lunch because if we eat in the cafeteria, the prices are pretty steep, and on top of that, you have to pay sales tax too! There is no such thing as an employee rebate here as well. So bringing a lunch box into the office is a sensible thing to do, PLUS you get to enjoy homecooked food. And of course, I get to do some bento-ing too!
My hubby and I are not into the TOO cutesy stuff of bento, rather we just prefer the simple meals that work to fill our tummies. Besides, I don’t have to pack bentos for Ethan just yet, because his daycare takes care of all his meals. On the other hand, even if I did have to pack Ethan a bento, he is not one to care too much for cutely shaped stuff. Trust me, I have tried and they don’t work. The most would be a nice adorable food pick or two, but that’s about it.
Anyway, so here’s my bento story for the week:
Monday
This is hubby’s bento for Monday, consisting of steamed rice with chicken stew, garnished with blanched broccoli and baby carrots. I threw in some juicy seedless grapes too.
Monday was my first day at work too, so I had a simple bento made for myself as well. It’s the same as what hubbs had but in a smaller portion. And I used two of the bento boxes I bought during my Daiso outing the other day for both hubby’s and my bento.
Later that evening however, hubbs complained his lunch was not enough as he was already hungry at 2:30p.m.! That means I need to get one of those two-tier men’s bento boxes for him…you know those that come in black or greyish hues and cost a fortune on ebay?
Tuesday
This is what hubby brought for lunch on Tuesday. It’s his favorite homecooked Hainanese Chicken Rice on a bed of lettuce with some chopped cili padi in a small container and of course, some soy sauce to go with it. I placed a banana in his lunch bag too in the hope that it would be more substantial.
Wednesday
My hubby’s lunch for Wednesday was a very simple meal: steamed rice with two side dishes: tau-ewe-bak (soy sauce pork stew) and stir-fried pumpkin with dried shrimp and minced turkey meat. Tau-ewe-bak goes really well with sambal belacan, so yeah, that’s what’s in the little orange container in the corner right there. And of course, I added the obligatory banana.
There wasn’t any more tau-ewe-bak left for me, so I only put its gravy on my rice. Of course, I packed a little bit more pumpkin for myself and added a cup of fruit jelly too. Oh yeah, and mine, I brought to the office in a little warmer bag, like so:
Didn’t really keep the stuff warm as it promised, but still a very handy little thing to carry around.
Thursday
I had an early meeting on Thursday and I was gonna attend the conference from home, so I made sure I got lunch packed and ready early too for hubby to bring to work. This is claypot chicken rice, garnished with spring onions and cilantro. And how can we not have claypot chicken rice without cili padi? The steamed baby carrots are added for color. And isn’t it obvious that I am trying to finish off the bananas in my house?
Friday
The cook is on official rest today because hubby has a team lunch every Friday, so I didn’t cook. I went out for Indian food with my colleagues today for lunch too, in fact.
Here’s to more bento adventures in the weeks to come!
My heart’s in San Francisco November 12, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Drooling & Cooking, Relax & Celebrate , 9commentsBeing in a foreign country, we try as far as possible to do *something* during the weekends. Although sometimes we really do feel like all we wanna do is to laze around the house, we try to make it a point to go someplace different. And last Sunday, we decided to make a short trip to one of my favorite cities in the world: San Francisco. Well, we didn’t tour the whole of San Francisco, instead, we just went to Pier 39 and Fisherman’s Wharf.
It must have been about 6 years or so since I had been there, and I definitely have very fond memories of this place. On the way to Pier 39, we passed the Bay Bridge that leads to Oakland, and the view was absolutely breathtaking.
The weather was cool and nice, perfect for a stroll. There were many people who had the same idea as us too, because that place was jampacked! We went to Pier 39 first to walk around the shops, and of course, hubbs could not resist taking photos of the boats that were docked there.
I wanted a few pictures with Ethan too, but you know, that fella was so excited with the new surroundings, I guess he wasn’t too happy when we asked him to pose for long. This was one of the ones that got away. You can see my 22-week belly showing too! 
Next, we made a pitstop to look at the sealions. They still had that cutesy sound I remembered oh-so-well, and most of them were basking in the sunset.
Then we took a walk over to Fisherman’s Wharf because we wanted to get a bite. There were many shops around, and yes, all of them served the very very famous clam chowder!
Some of the restaurants had dungeness crabs on the menu too. These are very rare in Malaysia, but apparently, they are very easily found here in Fisherman’s Wharf. We opted NOT to have crabs that day,… can you imagine the havoc of having to peel crabs while caring for a toddler? Nuh-uh…not a very good combination at all!
In the end, we ended up at a restaurant called Boudin, which prides itself as being the place were the famous sourdough bread all started.
Here in Fisherman’s Wharf, you HAVE to order the clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl. It is TO DIE FOR. And since we were rather hungry, we added a chicken salad sandwich too.
I am still dreaming of the clam chowder now. It was so thick, so creamy, so good (can you just taste it now?) ….and when you scrape the bread bowl at the end of it all, you just want to scream for more! The chicken sandwich was surprisingly good too. They put grapes in it - how’s that for unique?
And does this look spell SATISFACTION with a capital S?
have bump will travel far November 11, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Thoughts & Scribblings , 15commentsYesterday was my official first day back at work here in Santa Clara, California, after a one-month-long hiatus. Nothing spectacular happened at work, however. My hubby dropped me off at the office in the morning and I had a brief walk around the campus, being shown where everything was. My cubicle here is definitely WAY better than the one I have in Penang though. For one thing, this one here has WALLS!
I spent the day clearing my email backlog and submitting all the necessary forms for work here in California. Anyway, enough of boring work stuff. Wait till you hear about what I was up to LAST FRIDAY! Hehehe…. *rubs hands with glee*
So last Friday, being my last non-working weekday before I start work and all, I decided to go gallivanting on my own. Hubbs dropped Ethan off at daycare on his way to work and I quickly logged in to the PC to get some directions online. I was gonna take the light rail transit (VTA) and then board a bus to somewhere in Mountain View to visit the famous Daiso store!
I walked to the nearest VTA station (which took me about 6-8 minutes, and bought a $1.75 ticket that was valid for two hours. And I waited for the train.
And I waited some more… the train was late by about 15 minutes! But when it finally arrived, I boarded it happily and made my (roughly) 40-minute ride to Downtown Mountain View. The VTA train moved slower than the LRT back in Malaysia and had less passengers too. But they had a cool feature where people could ride their bikes, board the VTA and PARK their bikes nicely in the train.
Upon arrival in Mountain View, I waited for the bus to take me to San Antonio Shopping Center. That was another 5 minutes’ or so waiting time.
While waiting, my itchy eyes and itchy hands had to take this picture of birds perched on the lamp post nearby. Haha…don’t ask me why… Don’t you think the sky is just so BLUE?
Anyway, I finally arrived at the shopping center, but man, it was huge! I was reluctant to walk blindly looking for Daiso, so I asked for directions, and after a few minutes….
H-A-L-L-E-L-U-J-A-H!!!
I had only very little time to look around, because I wanted to be home by 2:30p.m., so I quickly went to the BENTO aisle and picked out some stuff. Actually, I kinda expected more…maybe longer aisles and more stuff, but still I managed to come back with this loot:
Everything in that store is seriously $1.50 unless stated otherwise, like the brown bento box in the far left corner, which I got for $3.00.
So, that was quite an adventure I had. A few booboos were that I spilled all of my root beer which I bought for lunch and I only managed to get back home at 3:00p.m. Oh yeah, and I also found out the hard way that in VTA trains, you need to press a strip stuck to the wall of the train to indicate you want to get down, otherwise the train will just whoosh past your station. SIGH. That’s what happened to me…so I had to wait for another train to take me back one station.
But all’s good. I got some bento stuff for lunch packing, and I rode the VTA! Yay! Now who says pregnant women have to lie down in bed the whole day long?
An itsy-bitsy taste of home November 4, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Thoughts & Scribblings , 10comments 
I could hardly believe it. IKEA is now not a tiring 4 hours’ drive away, but instead, it is only a short 20-minute drive away from our home. In a way, the convenience kind of scares us because it offers a temptation that is so hard to resist. What’s more, some of the items we were eyeing are even cheaper than those in Malaysia! Yeah, I kid you not.
Last Sunday was our second visit to IKEA in a month, and we only went there that day because they were having a 2-day promotion where the sales tax of 8.25% would be waived! There were slightly more people than usual, I would say, but there was no pushing or shoving around. Check out the escalators leading to the living room section of IKEA. Doesn’t it look oddly familiar, like you’ve seen it before somewhere, like in Mutiara Damansara? The East Palo Alto IKEA we went too consists of two storeys too, much like what we have in Malaysia, and the sections were pretty much similar, so it is quite easy to navigate around.
See, even the kids’ play area had a similar-looking slide. It was VERY hard to get Ethan to leave the play area, by the way.
In order to take advantage of the no-sales-tax promo, we bought a few items, like a bathtub for baby, a chair for Ethan, and an additional 17 gallon Samla box, which only cost $9.99. Compared to the price of RM45 in Malaysia for that same item, this one was a steal! We know it will come in handy because we used it when we were shipping our stuff to the US when we relocated here.
Well, too bad we could not buy the Billy bookcase too, as I had wanted. It just would not fit into our car! SIGH.
Truly thankful for these… November 2, 2008
Posted by The Giddy Tiger in : Thoughts & Scribblings , 12commentsAfter so many many days of dry weather, we were greeted with rain last Thursday. I was in the gym the day before, and saw the weather forecast on the news channel, which predicted half and inch of rain the next day. Lo and behold, when I took out the trash on Thursday afternoon, this site greeted me:
It’s actually drizzling, but you can’t see the raindrops in the picture. You can see that the ground is damp, however. And since that day, it has been raining here every day. The weather has started to get slightly colder because of that, and you know what, we realize now that we had forgotten to pack an umbrella. Bummer!
***
Also on that same Thursday, I received a call from the OB/GYN’s office in the morning, to inform me that there had been a last minute cancellation from one of the patients, and the nurse asked if I would be able to come in that afternoon itself for a checkup. After confirming with my hubby, we happily went for our checkup…which went well, I would say. Doc examined me and said that the pregnancy was doing fine, with me being 21 weeks along now and all. We also got to hear the baby’s heartbeat! Yay! But unfortunately here in the US, the ultrasound is done not by the doc himself, but by the Radiology department, and we had to have an appointment set up within the next week.
***
My Social Security Card arrived last Tuesday! That means that I am now able to take my written road test and get a driving permit to allow me to take the road test for my driver’s licence. I have, to date, completed 6 hours of driving lessons, and will be utilizing part of the last 2 hours for part of my driving test. We plan to take the written test sometime next week, so I am now *sorta* studying the small booklet of road rules.
***
And finally, tonight I am thankful for ONE additional hour of sleep, because Daylight Saving Time ends at 2:00a.m. Sunday morning. This will be my very first time experiencing a switch in time due to the end of DST, and I will be adjusting the clock back by an hour before I sleep tonight.
Of course, my additional one hour of sleep will solely depend on whether Ethan decides to cooperate or not.
Ethan Boy
Our Journey of Love
