Author: Pearl L

if you haven’t seen this yet, run run and take a look! vcsclip.mov this is SOOOOO COOL!! it’s a little compilation of a bunch of old school atari vcs games with a spiffy little soundtrack. watch it watch it watch it!

what an AWESOME AWESOME game! this is the game that got me hooked on Lucasarts stuff in the first place. but since it was made in 1994 or something for DOS in Windows 3.1 or Windows 95, there are lots of problems with running it on a newer machine. I was trying to run my copy on Windows XP and Windows 2000, only to find there was no sound and no voice (well, not quite no sound, but really really awful beepy sound). As it turns out, in newer versions of windows, dos’ ability to control the sound card/soundblaster is severely inhibited. solution for indy: download scummVM.

… and I don’t just mean in terms of security. if you’re looking to fly on most of the major airlines, expect a lot less convenience, much less tolerance for being late/missing your flight, tighter rules on flying standby, and a myriad of other things. there’s an article on cbs market watch here you can look at for more details.

btw, if you haven’t noticed, I’ve changed the color scheme of the site. :) please reload your browsers if you can’t see the new blues!
I also fixed some of the more recent web links to open in a new window when clicked. sorry i’ve been so lazy about doing it in the past~!!

i’m attempting to study for my final in my history of electronic dance class (read: rave class) but it’s really hard because i’m playing with bits of my website! -sob!- i’m so useless.

so here’s another update. this time it’s ALL ABOUT FOOD~!

Nate and Al’s. so after our respective mad paper writing rushes for soc1, julie and I decided to hit the road and grab some grub. we hit up a place called “nate and al’s” in beverly hills (which is seriously sooo close to ucla), a jewish deli. apparently, the food network did a special on the place, and julie decided she had to go. and me being constantly hungry, I had to tag along too.
&nbsp &nbsp the food was excellent! we each had a cup of soup – she got matzo ball, I got chicken noodle – and half a corned beef sandwich. first off, the chicken soup was really really tasty, and you could really taste all the veggies that helped flavor it. mmm. I was totally floored by the corned beef sandwich. i’m normally a pastrami kind o’ girl, but the corned beef they had there was completely melt-in-your-mouth yummy and not as super-greasy as pastrami normally seems to be. the potato salad that came with it was also surprising — usually sides are just an afterthought, but nate and al’s really made the most of a little dish. it was really creamy and really rich, but not as heavy and potato salads tend to be, and spiced just right. I was floored. plus, the price for soup and really huge sandwich was about $23, fairly reasonable compared to some other delis, and plus we got more food! the service was also really good. all the waitresses seemed like they’d been working there forever, so you had a really classic diner sort of feel. they knew the menu, and knew how to give good service and were not just saccharinely polite the way some of the younger waiters/waitresses are now. i’m defintely taking this place over Jerry’s Famous Deli from now on! you need to go there too~!

Al Gelato I’m a huuuuge gelato fan, and i finally got my fix at the local gelateria, al gelato. this is also in beverly hills on robertson. I had pear and passionfruit gelato while julie got the chocolate. my pear gelato was really really tasty, passionfruit was a little too sweet, but chocolate was DECADENT. SOO GOOD! head there if you can! it’s definitely one of the “can’t miss” places in la. :)

… not that I actually think you’ll want to comment on any of my posts, but if you do, you can~!!
thanks rich for introducing me to this~! yay!

in my head this morning: hi-five – kissing game
(olllld school!)
currently spinning: coldplay – a rush of blood to the head
joys of the day: seeing rich, jack, and steven on campus today while i’m supposed to be working on my paper for my history of electronic dance music class. thank you, rich, for the kind words on yer blog!!! :D wheeeeeeeeeee~!!!!! i think yours is spifferific too~!!!
stresses of the day: this is finals week. I have a paper due tomorrow, a paper due wednesday, and a final on thursday. oh maaaaaaaaan!
worry of the day: that I won’t get it all done!

I was stressing about my paper for my soc class so julie and I went to go talk to my professor after class. so I went off on my professor about all the different theories and how I wasn’t sure about what they were and how to apply them, etc etc and I started rambling (like i do in this blog and on the class discussion board… *groan*) and he stopped me and said, “Don’t think too much.”

dude, what does it mean when your professor tells you not to think so much? -head thunks on table.-

my mom called when I was in class, so I called her back after and proceeded to whine about my consistent inability to write papers. oh sure, I can ramble on like the best (or is it the worst?) of them… I just don’t end up with any sort of point to anything i’m saying! she laughed at me. I whined and said I was too much like my dad (guess where I get my rambling tendencies from?? dude, I sat through sooo many lectures, wondering what the heck he was getting at. I think I’ve learned to speak around points now too! *SOB!*). she told me not to worry and just concentrate on a few things and just… write.

geez louise. I can’t write worth beeans. I have no idea what I’m going to do to focus myself and keep from writing some rambling pseudo-opus with the length of War and Peace, a book, by the way, I’ve never been able to finish reading. then again, you’d be surprised how illiterate I am (well… maybe you wouldn’t be surprised…)

anyway, I’m gonna try to get back to work. wish me luck. -sob!-

Coldplay’s new album is awesome. It’s called a Rush of Blood to the Head, and it is in high rotation in pearl’s ride. for those of you who haven’t heard it, listen to the album online: www.arushofbloodtothehead.com

(for those who are not in the know, pearl’s ride is a silver 2002 nissan sentra that’s not quite silver cuz it is begging to be washed properly. I have no covered parking at the moment, just street parking by the beach or in front of a neighbor’s errant sprinklers, so i’m sure my paint isn’t doing too well. oh man. but it got really good gas mileage on our drive to vegas… about 250 miles to half a tank of gas! sweeeeet! anyway, i’ll be passing my car onto me sister for a few months — a long story — but maybe i’ll eventually get it back. I hope. I rather like my car!)

Pearl’s ride was also the vehicle for destination:vegas this past weekend, where jer and I went to see COLDPLAY at the Hard Rock Hotel/Casino. Chris Martin and the rest of the band ROCKED, even though they were slightly incoherent throughout the show — bad microphones and thick accents aren’t a good combination. the band played a surprisingly long set — almost every song on both of their albums, and every song sounded awesome, in spite of the funky sound system. Chris Martin’s piano playing is fun to watch and sweet to listen to, and the guitarist’s plinging riffs were pure bliss. YAAAAAY for coldplay!

I don’t have a setlist for the show, but I’ll try to find one to post up in the near future.

anyway, las vegas was, as always, quite fun. jer was introduced to the joys of Fat Tuesday and good ol’ Everclear and the yummerific prime rib at Kokomo’s at the Mirage. HANDS DOWN it is the BEST PRIME RIB out there! Better than Houston’s by far. Are you reading this, HT? you need to go to Kokomo’s!!!

We also at the the Paris buffet on Friday night and OMIGOSH it is SOOOOOOOOOOO GOOD. I think it’s better than the Bellagio buffet, at least in terms of variety and quality of the food. the variety is stunning: I think there were maybe 6 stations of entree items with 4-6 dishes at each one. and then there are the crab leg/cocktail shrimp yummies, dessert stands, etc. so you do the math. their dessert selection was comparable to Bellagio’s, and they had the most delicious cream for their cream puffs and crepes. and AAAAH!! their crepes were SOOOO GOOD!! plus the ambience of the dining area (divided into themed rooms — one like a countryside kitchen, others like formal dining halls, etc) was really nice. but the FOOD! -gasps- if you like seafood, this is the one for you. we had some awesome marinated clams and mussels and fish and etc etc. we ate sooo well. we ate too much, but it was a lot of fun getting there. =)

overall, a fun trip, although it was without the trip to the Sahara and their $1 tables. -snaps fingers-. rich is correct in his posting about las vegas: 10 hour buzz followed by headache. *ooooof.* but it’s rather fun while it lasts ;o)

lessons learned:
1. bring earplugs to all concerts in the future.
2. grain alcohol (everclear) is pretty damn hard on the system, but boy is it a nice way to get toasted.
3. the MGM/Mirage Players Club card isn’t active until September 15th.
4. the tigers (both the white and the yellow ones) at the Mirage better than the narcoleptic lion at the MGM Grand.
5. between the excellent food at Paris and Kokomo’s, it’s tooo easy to gorge oneself with food. our bodies seriously can’t handle it! -sniffle!-
6. what traveling salesman sold Bally’s and MGM the Monorail? did Leonard Nimoy help with the maiden voyage?
7. bring Grim Fandango with the laptop cuz we’re getting too old and will have downtime, so we might as well play a good game :)
8. pearl looks like she’s 12 and will get carded whereever she goes, especially in chun-li buns and a weezer shirt.
9. coldplay is most definitely worth seeing in concert.
10. we must go back to vegas again. :)

upcoming concerts:
DOVES at the MAYAN. should be, once again, an awesome show except for the sound system. if you like coldplay, you will like doves. personally, I think coldplay is trying to sound like doves, but that’s another post altogether.
NO DOUBT/GARBAGE/DISTILLERS at the LONG BEACH ARENA. there are still some tickets available! should be a fantastic show!

as some of you may or may not already know, my family no longer lives in fremont. :(

ok, so earlier in my blog, I was talking about moving and such right? and then we decided we weren’t going to move? well, basically, we changed our minds again and decided to move, only this time, we decided to move to union city.

(everyone scream with me: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!)

it’s not so bad! the new house is gorgeous… a lot bigger than my old place, for anyone who’s seen my old place. we have a backyard again, and not just a puny patio (which was nice… but a wee bit small). it’s one of them development homes — every place looks exactly the same, but they’re well designed homes, which is more than I can say for the development homes in fremont. so my family in fremont was basically moving about the same time I was packing up and moving out of my apartment in westwood. complete madness for ze entire family! zoiks!

still, it all went well. it’s wonderful to come home to a new home and have s p a c e. we have a garage again, we have a really nice big kitchen, we have lots of sunshine, and a garden in the back with lots of little baby fruit trees! we have kiwi, peaches, tomatoes, grapes… and all sorts of other stuff I can’t remember right now.

most of all, i’m completely overjoyed for my parents. i’ve always felt for the longest time that both my parents suffered through so much for so long… and this is a just reward for them. it’s a source of pride and happiness — my mother has a beautiful house she can make a home for herself and the family, and my father has a garden in the back he can tend to, my sister redecorated her room with new furniture and lots of cute little touches. and me? eh. I’ve got a mattress slapped on the floor, and my huge office desk is moved in. it’s not my room yet, but i love running through the house, sitting on the stairs and feeling the sunlight lazily wash through the windows, and the adventure of trying to figure out where everything is! and yet, even though it is so new, it somehow still feels more like home than any other house we’ve had.

come visit! :)