Allan's interests to the MAX

Here’s the best elf from last Christmas’s company party

This year’s company party didn’t have the fun competitions and instead was a company funded dinner at everyone’s favorite Chinese/Asian fusion restaurant, P.F. Chang’s.

Now, I went into P.F Chang’s with an open mind, hoping that all the negative comments people have been giving me about this place were slightly overblown. I’m going to cut to the chase, they were not slightly overblown.

First off, I’d like to comment on the environment. I think they got that down pat. It’s basically every Chinese/Asian decor stereotype mashed into a restaurant. From the large Chinese mural above the open kitchen to the Terracotta army soldier reproduction guarding my table, it couldn’t have gotten more tacky. The ‘Chinese’ interior of PF Chang’s can be likened to what the inside of Disney’s California Adventure looks like compared to real Califorinia.

Anyway, let’s move to the menu:

Rice – Uncle Ben’s long grain instant or very similar to it. Why not use Calrose rice here? Isn’t California one of the largest growers of Calrose in the world (I think I’m probably mistaking this for one of the largest EXPORTERS of rice in the world, everyone else, like China, eats their rice instead of exporting it)? It’s also cheaper than Uncle Ben’s as far as I know.

Tea – Why would you infuse fruit into oolong tea? Seriously? It wasn’t even loose leaf.  Pretty much the worst oolong tea I have ever had. What’s wrong with run of the mill oolong? In fact, every tea they had had some kind of fruit flavoring mixed into it.

Appetizers:

Crab Wontons – Okay, let’s imagine a California roll from your local fast food sushi place. Alright. Now, imagine the taste of that (without the rice) inside of an egg roll skin. Got it? Yea, that’s basically what this dish is.

Chang’s Chicken Lettuce wraps – So, have you ever cut a half of head of lettuce in half length wise? Yea, that’s what you’re going to get to wrap your heavily oiled chicken with.  I mean, this was arguably the best dish we got all night, so I’ll give credit were credit is due.

Chicken Chopped Salad – Look, there are no salads in Chinese cooking. Thanks for adding the wonton skins though.

Entrees:

Chang’s Spicy Chicken – Not actually spicy. More like, um… not spicy? That’s probably the nicest thing I have to say about this chicken. It’s better and spicier at Panda Express. At least you know Panda isn’t trying to be pretentious about it being ‘gourmet.’

Mongolian Beef – The scallions in this dish were larger than the slices of beef. They were so large, in fact, that I mistook them for green beans and ate an entire mouthful. I blame the super dark lighting in the place for not helping me discern what I was exactly eating. When I was able to get past the large amount of garlic and scallions put in this dish, I felt the beef wasn’t half bad. Slightly sweet with good texture. This was my favorite dish of the night but that’s not saying much.

Shrimp with lobster sauce – I don’t know what to say about this. It was edible and non-offensive. For everyone out there who hasn’t had this dish, it does not actually contain any lobster despite its name.

Lo mein – I’m not sure if this was the combo version or not, but I’m sure they are fairly similar. Once again, nothing remarkable about this dish. I think they are opposed to cutting the cheaper vegetables in PF Chang’s kitchen because those pieces (String beans, broccoli, etc) were definitely whole and plentiful in this dish while the shiitake mushrooms were cut into oblivion. Maybe that’s Paul Fleming’s way of helping Americans deal with a vegetable they don’t eat all the time.

Dessert:

Carrot Cake – Think Hometown buffet-style dessert except less fresh. Done.

[also posted on yelp]

Life is almost as simple as that.

I just have not found the motivation to post something as of late. Also, blogging takes a lot of time and effort that I didn’t not realize until I started blogging. Kudos to all of those people who have successful and entertaining blogs.

I heard Sabrosa Purr Friday night at the Roxy and I have to tell you now to avoid this band as much as possible. Their front man, Will Love, is probably the most pretentious stage presence I have ever seen. There were points in their set where it seemed like his pretentiousness was offensive even to his own band. Maybe if he learned how to play the electric guitar at least as well as his bandmate, Jeff Mendel, then possibly he’d be tolerable. The most obnoxious thing of the night was his amazingly forced “nu metal” shrieking. When Love wasn’t shrieking into the microphone, the band was at least tolerable, but unfortunately, Sabrosa Purr’s ‘formulaic’ songs all involve Love shrieking into the mic about halfway through the song. Too bad. I hope they figure out that the stuff they play was ‘edgy’ back in the 1970s, and even then, it was done better.

I’ve been working diligently toward a February 1st work deadline. That’s what I’ve been doing and therefore this blog has fallen by the wayside. In any case, there is a book everyone should check out and read The Design of Everyday Things. It’s an enlightening book on design. I mean, have you ever tried to work an automatic sink (you know, the ones with the motion sensors) and totally not figure it out. How about mistaking a manual sink with one that you thought was a motion sensing sink? Another one that happens to me frequently are glass doors that I can’t figure out whether I should push or pull to open. Those are examples of horrible design. Alright, thanks for stopping in.

The internet occupies a large portion of my life currently. For better or for worse, I am tied to the internet. Sometimes, I don’t even know why I’m online. Which brings me to today’s topic of “What if the internet was destroyed overnight. How would your life change?” as seen on the reddit.com

Well, first of all, I wouldn’t have a job anymore. The entire web programming industry would disappear. I would have no old world skills like candle making or shoe cobbling to fall back on. In all seriousness, I don’t really don’t know what I would do if I wasn’t doing software development. This is kind of making me dizzy thinking about the possibility of not doing programming anymore. I would have to go back to school first of all since I don’t have a background in anything. Maybe I would take up welding? That seems like a job that is very specialized and well-paying if you’re a good/great welder. Nevermind, in most cases, looks like it’d be a pay downgrade. Oh well, welding would still be a great practical skill though.

Anyway, my head is starting to get dizzy at the prospect of changing careers due to the disappearance of the internet.