Travel blog advice woe

When I was researching San Diego to see what we’d do here, I was getting bored of looking at TripAdvisor and looked to some travel blogs for some semi off-the-beaten path ideas. One of these ideas was what was labeled “the seven bridges walk,” which was supposed to be an interesting walk around the city or what the travel blogger called “an urban hike.” There are few changes in elevation, and the walk takes you to seven (actually eight if you count *all* of them) pedestrian bridges through the city. I thought it sounded like it could be different, so I put it on our list. And then as we went on it, I realized how annoying it was.

Not only was it a seemingly meaningless “hike” with little interesting to see, but it even backtracked and made us walk across a bridge… to then walk right back across it again to where we came from. What kind of “hike” is that?! If you ever try looking for “different” things to do in San Diego, by all means avoid this “walk” completely!

We would have been better off sticking with wandering around Balboa Park.

San Diego food

We’re spending a long weekend here since Chris was here for work this week, and the main thing on my list was to eat, eat, and eat. Of course, the ocean and sunsets also excited me, but San Diego screams Mexican food to me, and I barely remembered any of the food I ate the last time I was in San Diego, which was almost 18 years ago. Chances are that it wasn’t that good and was mostly touristy, too.

Last night when I came in, Chris took me to the Marriott Marquis hotel restaurant, where I hesitantly ordered the California wet burrito on the menu because I was craving burritos. I wasn’t sure what to expect of it until it arrived, but when it did and I took my first bite, I was thoroughly satisfied: the steak was grilled and cooked perfectly, and it was stuffed with guacamole, sour cream, and even French fries that managed to retain their crisp. This was a darn good burrito for a hotel restaurant.

Today for lunch, after waiting about half an hour, we went to a no-frills hole-in-the-wall restaurant in a more run down area of San Diego. We walked through tents and tents of homeless people to get there. The restaurant reminded me so much of the places I’d eaten at in Mexico — the plain tables, the minimal signage for the food, the cheap white plastic chairs. We had crispy chicken tacos, flautas, a tamale, and a “small” (it was quite large) helping of rice and beans with house-made flour tortillas. I usually don’t want flour tortillas, but these were the best and softest I’d ever had with just a slight char. This place couldn’t have been any better: they made all their own tortillas, made all the tacos to order, gave you ample cotija cheese, cilantro, limes, and onions, and even soaked chunks of pork fat into their hot sauce. And our massive lunch cost $15 total. It was like we robbed the place.

I wish we had Mexican food this delicious in Manhattan. I will be salivating about these meals for a long time.

Platinum status kids

I was headed toward my gate for my San Diego-bound flight this afternoon at JFK airport when I noticed two girls who couldn’t have been older than 13 checking their boarding passes and loudly speaking to each other. “They just announced they are boarding executive platinum and platinum fliers,” one of the girls said. “We’re platinum, so we should board now, too.” There wasn’t even a semblance of a line, just a big crowd in front of the “priority” and “main” aisles to board the flight, so I rushed ahead of them into the priority line, scanned my electronic ticket, and got on the plane.

As I sat on the plane, I thought about how crazy it was that these two girls who were barely teenagers had platinum status on American Airlines; that’s at least 50,000 miles flown each year, assuming economy class tickets and that we’re going by mileage only. I just started getting this level of status in the two years, and that was when I was 28. When I was 13, I had only boarded one dinky flight, and that was from San Francisco to Las Vegas. I wondered if they argued about their upgrades and tracked their frequent flier status all the time, too. It’s certainly a life I never had when I was that young. I also wonder if they try to talk about platinum status and frequent flier privileges with their peers, who have no idea what the big deal is and what all these terms even mean. Maybe one day I will have children who are like that, all because of the privileges that their mommy and daddy gave them.

A grandma and her granddaughter

I was on a crowded train going home this early evening, standing in front of a grandma and her granddaughter, sitting down and talking in Cantonese. It was clear that the grandma had picked up the little girl either from school or some after-school program, and the girl was explaining to her grandma what her little pez dispenser was and how you get candy to pop out of it. The grandma laughed when she watched the girl dispense candy out of it, and she tousled the girl’s hair affectionately while commenting how interesting toys are these days (never mind that pez candies have been around forever).

I thought about my own grandma and how I lost her in October 1995. I was only nine years old, probably just a little older than this little girl I was observing. Rarely was she so interested in things I brought home from school, nor was she ever affectionate or touched me kindly, with the exception of holding my hand when I was very young while crossing the street. I think about how pretty much all of my friends have living grandparents, and it made me wistful and wonder what it would be like if she were still around. If she were alive today, she’d be 100 years old this September.

It’s a good thing she isn’t still here, though. It’s sad to say that, but too many terrible and destructive things have happened in this family since her passing. I don’t know how she would have handled knowing her youngest grandson committed suicide. She loved my brother very much and was often accused by my parents of spoiling him rotten (hardly the case). She wouldn’t have accepted a daughter in law fleeing to Boston.

On the side of things that aren’t “bad” but in her eyes would be horrendous, she wouldn’t have liked that two of her grandsons married non-Chinese women, nor would she have been a fan of my new brown husband, or the fact that he is from Australia. I also think she would have screamed endlessly at the idea of my going to college in Boston, and then again at my moving to New York after graduation and not moving back home immediately. I guess it’s all timing.

I wonder if she is screaming at Ed in heaven or wherever they are. If she is, poor Ed.

Purse organizers

In addition to following a handful of food blogs, I also follow a couple of fashion blogs for inspiration. One of these blogs specializes in fashion for petite women like myself, so I’ve actually gotten a lot of good tips regarding petite-friendly brands, how to wear certain pieces I never thought a small person could wear, etc. One of the latest posts from this blog was about purse organizers for large totes. Most large totes, if you are lucky, have the main compartment, maybe one zip compartment, and two pockets.. at most. This has always been a huge gripe of mine regarding hand bags and purses; why do they make it so difficult for you to organize all of the belongings that you need to carry with you? Why won’t they just factor these compartments into the overall design, especially given how expensive women’s purses can be?  And the bigger the bag, the more pockets and compartments you’d typically need, but no, these handbag companies do not care. They are sticking with their one-main-compartment schtick, and they don’t care what you want. Because of that, all these companies are coming out with “hand bag organizers” like this in an effort to cash in on the areas that these hand bag companies won’t help you with. Yes, I can see that these things are necessary, but my point is that it is frustrating that the handbag companies don’t take care of this on their own and require external companies to charge us even more money for dumb organizers like this.

Unexpected wedding card

We received a wedding card in the mail a few days ago from one of my San Francisco friends I met through my mom’s Jehovah’s Witness congregation. The card had a very long, thoughtful, and sweet message. I’m always touched whenever I open a card that anyone gives me nowadays and the written message is more than just a line or two; pretty much no one seems to do that nowadays, nor do people value it. But it always makes me happy and wish that more people would value little things like this that require a lot of time and thought. I feel like I am getting old and dating myself by saying this, but there’s such an emphasis on things being fast and convenient nowadays that we rarely stop to appreciate things like a handwritten card or a homemade meal. My eyes feel like bleeding when I think of future children and how they may or may not value these things.

Surrounded by babies

We spent the day today in Dunellen, New Jersey, visiting Chris’s friend and her husband, who gave birth to a baby boy just four days after our wedding. They also invited a few other friends and neighbors over who also had recently given birth in the last year, so we were literally surrounded by babies for our time in the suburbs. And with that came lots of teasing for us about when we were planning to have children and “start preparing.” Lots of parenting and bottle “nipple” advice ensued.

Yes, this is what I’ve been waiting for, to get inundated by questions of when I will soon be a baby-making machine instead of an independent, working, but married woman. It doesn’t matter how much society “progresses” because these expectations will still be there, especially when people find out I’m 30 — that is to say, “not that young anymore.”

Birthday call

It is my father-in-law’s birthday today, so Chris and I gave him a call this early evening to send him birthday wishes. They are currently in Sydney celebrating with Ben and have been doing a number of fun things, such as taking a cruise along the harbour, visiting the famous Taronga Zoo, and having what looked like a delicious Malaysian dinner complete with wine along Darling Harbour with Chris’s cousin and boyfriend. We chatted about what they were doing in Sydney and what they were eating and drinking, and they asked what we had been up to. I told them about our banana coconut pancakes, our massage and our wonton noodle dinner in Chinatown earlier, and Chris told them that Ben should be using a FitBit and not some exercise tracker of Garmin, which would be going out of business at some point soon. All in all, it was a pretty standard Jacob family conversation.

The one thing I will never really understand but will always respect about Chris’s parents is that they really expect nothing of their children. They don’t get all angry if a gift doesn’t arrive on Mother’s Day or their birthday. They don’t yell if Chris or Ben calls the day after a birthday and not on the day of. They never seem to get mad about anything, actually. There is never a need for them to pull Chris or Ben aside when I am there and have some private “chat” where they are getting scolded at. Everything is out in the open. Nothing is a secret at all.

I wish that was the way it was with my family.

“Special” money

Ever since I started working, regardless of what bonus or raise I got, I never really thought much of the additional dollars I was getting directly deposited into my bank account. Our society kind of brainwashes you into thinking that whenever you get a bonus or a raise or pay bump of any kind that you should reward yourself! Treat yo’self! Indulge more! You deserve it! Up until around 2012 to 2013, I barely bought clothes because I enjoyed the process of trying on new clothes or buying new things. Clothes were just for utility. Getting my nails done? Eh, what a waste of money! “Treating” myself hasn’t really been something I’ve thought that much about…. well, outside of traveling and eating.

So at dinner tonight, my friend who was in town from San Francisco for a wedding told me that she got some monetary prize at work, and everyone was asking her what she would spend the extra money on. “I don’t know,” she responded. “Whatever I need to purchase next.” No one really got her, and they were flabbergasted that she was being so practical about it all, that she wasn’t planning to buy herself a special new designer purse or some extravagant piece of jewelry or coat with the extra dollars.

Well, I get her. That’s exactly the way I operate. I got a raise or a bonus? Great. What’s next to buy or do that’s on my list?

Credit card companies hate people like the two of us. We pay our credit cards in full and never over spend, which means we never rack up interest payments. Take that, credit card companies.

Atlanta dining

I’m here in Atlanta for a work session with clients today, and of course, as an end to an all-day reporting session, they asked if we could take them out for a celebratory dinner. I obliged by taking them to one of Atlanta’s supposedly best steak houses Marcel, and I left thoroughly disappointed.

I really don’t go out for steak that often. I’ve probably eaten steak in New York City at six or seven different steakhouses, but every single time I’ve gone, I’ve always left satisfied. The quality of the meat, the medium rareness of the meat, the great crust and sear, the light amount of seasoning — all these things have to come together for a steak to be notable. Tonight’s eight-ounce madame filet was a complete disappointment. The sear on the outside was so-so — no nice crust that was apparent. The inside was like flappy meat medium rare. Each bite was worse than the last. It was also horribly over-salted and made me feel like I was going to get high blood pressure afterwards from all the excessive sodium. So I ate about half of it and called it quits. Maybe dessert would be better?

The strawberry mascarpone crepe cake would have made Lady M Confections cry, as they do such an incredibly light and airy crepe cake, and Marcel… well, Marcel gives you the densest, heaviest possible crepe cake. The clients raved about their steak and crepe cake (almost everyone chose the crepe cake for dessert), and I sat there silently, smiling and nodding, trying very hard to refrain from not giving my New Yorker-side judgmental comments on how subpar both the steak and the crepe cake were here.

At least the spinach gnudi and the wine were good.

Atlanta’s dining scene is budding and getting increasingly more diverse (and more expensive). I am always excited to eat in this city, but this meal left such a bad taste in my mouth for steak in Atlanta. I will save my steak cravings for when I am back home in New York.