Dinner today -> Soba and Schnitzel

Went to Farmboy and found Schnitzel on sale. That triggered my desire for some Soba noodles and Tonkatsu (subbing in Schnitzel). The Schnitzel didn't brown very well at all, but was still good. Adding some Tonkatsu Sauce made it better.


/Galvatron/ "Prime. I demand a time-out in our war, to stop for dinner!"
/Optimus Prime/ "Time-out Galvatron? You can't do that..." *sniff sniff* "smells good... OK time-out."


/Galvatron/ "I'm so full... oh..."
/Optimus Prime/ "I'm so stuffed, I can't transform and roll out..."

Dinner today -> Broccoli and Steak - Rnd 2

Made some more Broccoli and Steak today. Used MTL Steak Spice today, so no sauce.


/Megatron/ "STARSCREAM! Do not eat MY food!"
/Starscream/ "Mighty Megatron, I swear I was only looking!"

Tasty Seaweed

Ate a new brand of flavoured seaweed today. I got it from my good friend Thu. It's so good. I went after work to buy some more from a nearby asian grocery store, but was closed.
I think this will taste really good when I use it to make some onigiri.


/Bumblebee/ *CRUNCH, nom, nom, nom* "Big Bot's really going to like this." *nom, nom*

AKB48 - NY Concert Highlights

I finally finished reading about 10 pages of reviews. If people want to watch, someone made a highlight video of the AKB48 NY Concert.
Link
"Blue Rose" is in it! (the 3rd song with 4 girls dressed in black) Awesome song. Watch it while you can. It'll probably be removed by the AKB management soon.

There was an NHK news report about the concert too. The reporter in NY called the people in line "Otaku Gaijin" (translates roughly to "foreign nerds"). LOL

Cool Fact: After the concert, while waiting for the bus to leave, Yuko and Takamina got off the bus to take pics with the fans. That is so cool of them to do that.
Link

Dinner today -> Broccoli and Steak

Got a hockey draft tonight for the CMC hockey pool. For energy, I made some steak and broccoli for dinner. Made some Andy's Secret Sauce (aka ASS) for the steak too. LOL, thanks Peter. To make it, in the pan where the steak was cooked, add ketchup, some Worcester sauce, and little soy sauce. Heat on max, mix it together while scrapping the steak bits off the pan. When the sauce bubbles, it's done.


/Grimlock/ "Me Grimlock like broccoli and steak with ASS"
/Sideswipe/ "Yeh... ASS?"

Free Electric Organ

My parents are giving this Electric Organ away. Does anyone want it? It has a bench too.

^Electric Organ

Happy Birthday Mom!

Happy Birthday!


^ Strawberry Short Cake

Weekend Idol Events

Stayed up til 2:30am last night to watch Music Station on TV Japan ). Morning Musume was on as a guest, and they were 2nd last to perform. They sang "Renai Revolution 21" with some graduated members, and their latest single "Nanchatte Renai" (#3 on chart countdown). It was a pretty good performance, but you can really tell that Morning Musume will live and die through their leader, Takahashi Ai. She is by far the best singer of the group, and once she graduates it'll be over for Morning Musume.


^ Takahashi Ai

Also this weekend, AKB48 was at the New York Anime Festival. Been reading about it on fan-sites and the girl's blogs; and watching a bunch Youtube videos of the mini-live they had on Saturday. They're also having a free concert on Sunday night at Webster Hall. Tickets to the concert were included for VIP ticket holders, and the rest were randomly given out in a draw. I'm thinking I should have gone, but the VIP tickets were $200 and were sold out within days of the announcement of AKB48 being there. Autograph/meet and greet tickets were also available to the first 50 people in line on Saturday. (Read that the lineup started before 5:30am when the event was at 2pm.)






^ AKB48 mini-live pics
(credit to Stage48 site)

While those AKB48 members were in NY, Kasai Tomomi was in Tokyo promoting her new collector cards. She's was dressed up in her Halloween costume - a devil maid (looks like a costume right out of Disgaea). The cards are sold out, but I got 2 boxes of her cards :)


^ Devil Maid Kasai (kawaii)

Lunch today -> Beef & Chinese Greens on Rice

Went to Costco this morning hoping to get 5lbs of mussels, but the Seafood Event wasn't happening this weekend. Bought some AAA grade Top Sirloin Steak instead.


Beef and Chinese Greens


+ White Rice


= Beef and Chinese Greens on Rice.

The key is using potato starch to thicken the sauce.

Friday Sept 25/09 -> M:tG

Played some Magic Friday night. It was planned for 3-players, but Gordon didn't make it. Ben and I played and tried out the new Planechase Planes. The new Planes added a new randomness to the game and is pretty fun.


^ Lost this game using my Zombie Deck. I was at 10 life and going to win on the next turn. Ben was able to do 9 points of damage to me on his turn, so that during my next upkeep I lost 1 life due to Phyrexian Arena! Unbelievable!

Later that night Ben and I finished Ultimate Alliances 2 on XBox360. I think were going to finish it again on the unlocked hardest difficulty.

2nd Blooming of Strawberries

Since the weather has been so nice the last few weeks, my strawberry plant is blooming a 2nd round of strawberries.


^1 is really red already. Ready for picking.

Earlier in the summer, I had a about a dozen strawberries almost ready for picking. Before I picked them, some animal ate most of them (I think it was a skunk ~ saw it ran over 1 street over). I was only able to pick about 5 strawberries from that batch.

Feature -> Random Lunch Inspection - Sept 2009

Today at CMC, I decided to do a "Random Lunch Inspection". Lets see what is on the menu today...


^Andrew's lunch. He started eating before 11:30am, so another carrot and some almonds are missing. Looks like a healthy, fibre heavy lunch.
Fongpay Rating: 1.5 Stars. Lacks non-healthy stuff and meat. (Lunch Hint: next time throw a cookie in there to recover some points)


^Steve's lunch. There's good looking chicken-salad sandwich made with chicken, cucumber, celery, mayo, and apples! Flanked by healthy side-dishes too.
Fongpay Rating: 2 Stars. Average lunch. Lost points for apples in the sandwich.


^Stefano's lunch. The famous Lettuce Sandwich is on display here. Also on display are the default tunafish and apple.
Fongpay Rating: 2.5 Stars. Nothing special, just the default normal lunch. Don't think its enough food for Stefano though.
(Lunch hint: This lunch can be seen any weekday, at CMC, for the next 100 years ^_^)


^Marc's lunch. Pasta in tomato sauce. From the freezer to the lunch table.
Fongpay Rating: 3 Stars. Looks good. Lacks meat, but large quantity.


^Jim's lunch. Nice big lunch with lots of good variety. Me liking the wings, strawberries, and brownies.
Fongpay Rating: 4.5 Stars. A top notch lunch.


^Fongpay's lunch. Some egg-white noodles, sliced MTL spiced steak, and honey-garlic BBQ ribs. All made by Iron Chef Fongpay.
Fongpay Rating: N/A since it's my blog it wouldn't be fair. (But if forced to, I'd give it 4.5 Stars. Lost points for the navel orange because it was sour.)

Note: Due to today's "Lunch & Learn" at CMC, some lunch members were missing. I'll get them on my next "Random Lunch Inspection".

Package from Japan

Got a small package in the mail today. Its from Japan. Check out some of the stuff I ordered:


Bags of Takoyaki Puff treats, a Onigiri shaped sponge, a Japanese fan, a JR Akihabara Station towel, and some other Christmas presents stuff not shown :)


The Takoyaki Puffs tastes really good. Don't think 3 bags were enough. CMC people can drop by my desk Wednesday for samples.

Happy Birthday Everett!

Happy 1st Birthday Everett! Uncle Andy has a cool birthday gift for you. I can spoil your gift here since you don't understand yet. I'll drop it off at your parent's house today. (Jeff/Linda will you be home around 6pm?)


Cool Interactive Mail Box

Sunday Status

Made myself some cheese steak sandwiches for dinner. They were good. I made 2 more for lunch on Monday, but I just remembered that I have a free BBQ at CMC on Monday. I'm eating the extra 2 sandwiches now. Yummy :)


Didn't do too much on the weekend but play alot of Marvel Alliances 2 at my bro's house. Currently leveling Wolverine and Hulk. I was using Juggernaut, but I think Hulk's powers are better. Ben is leveling Iceman and Spidey.

Also caught up on some more AKB48 TV shows. The 1st show is called "AKB48 Nemosu TV Season 2". Episode 10 & 11 has 6 of the girls climbing Mt.Fuji (Oshima Yuko is the climb leader ~yay~). The climb looks so awesome. If I can, I think I'd really like to try climbing it when I go back to Japan. It looks tough but the view is spectacular. There are 10 staging areas to reach the peak. The funniest part of the show happens when the girls reach the 6th stage. The host gives each of them some "oxygen" bottles to help with the climb. Together, the girls tryout the "oxygen" and then start talking to the camera in squeaky chipmunk voices! They got tricking into breathing helium and they reacted like WTF! ROFLOL :)

The 2nd show I watched is called Shukan AKB. This weeks episode was an intelligence test. Not one of the better episodes since I don't know what most of the questions they asked meant. I'll have to wait for a summary. In the end, Kasai ranked #19 of the 20 girls in this episode (score of 80/300). :(

Some Morning Musume news: Kusumi Koharu announced she is going to graduate from Morning Musume and Hello! Project in Dec. Wasn't a fan of hers, but I didn't expect her to graduate so soon.

Dinner today -> Spicy Tofu Pork

Made spicy tofu pork tonight for dinner. Turned out pretty well, but I forgot to use sake and chili flakes. Didn't make rice to go with it, so I'm having it with some mini-hogie buns from Farmboy.


Wreckgar says its not spicy enough. I got to agree.

Sen's Fan Fest and Groceries

Went to the Corel Centre this morning for the Ottawa Senator's Fan Fest. There were some events going on, but I was only there for the used equipment sale. I was looking to buy a used Sens Black jersey, but when I got there, there was no used equipment tent. I knew the sale was last Wednesday, but I was told it was on again this morning. I was disappointed.

I then left to get groceries at Uni. Picked up veggies, pork, BBQ buns, and some Fried Female Capelin. They're filled with roe (fish eggs) and really good.


Fried Female Capelin


Roe filling... yummy :)

Dinner Friday -> Chinese Takeout

Ordered takeout from Rideau Restaurant on Friday. Got Beef Chow Mein and Dry Fried Rice Noodles with Beef. Took it to Ben's house to eat and then play Marvel Alliances 2 on X360. Apparently he had the same idea for dinner and ordered from Rideau too. He got Beef Chow Mein and Salty Fish Fried Rice (yuck).


Beef Chow Mein and Dry Fried Rice Noodles with Beef

Breakfast today -> BK English Muffin

Got myself a FREE Burger King "English Muffin" this morning. Never had one before. It has sausage, egg, and cheese in it. It was pretty good. Shared half of it with Thu during CMC breakfast time. I think I like it more than McDonald's McMuffin.

FYI: CMC readers -> Free BBQ lunch on Monday.

Breakfast today -> Mmmm... Doughnuts.

Free Tim Horton's coffee and doughnuts this morning at CMC.
Round 1: Small coffee and a Boston Cream doughnut. Boston Cream is the best!
Round 2: Rainbow sprinkles doughnut. Disappointed with this one. It wasn't sweet enough.
Round 3: Was thinking about a 3rd trip but didn't go.

FYI: Free Burger King Breakfast Burger
No purchase is necessary, the offer is available Friday Sept. 18 during "breakfast hours" only. It doesn't include the "Enormous Omelette Sandwich.

AKBingo! and Jpop Idol Music

I figure I'll post another entry while waiting for today's new episode of AKBingo! to finish downloading.

I like listening to Japanese music (like Yui, Exile, Perfume), but mainly its Jpop Idol music, and specifically Morning Musume and AKB48. I'm currently totally into AKB48. I used to be really into Morning Musume, but since they ended their TV shows and that their recent singles weren't that good, I've moved on to AKB48. I still like Morning Musume, but AKB48 has more song variation and selection (over 100+ songs), and their group's member's personalities are more interesting. (Plus I find the AKB48 girls just that much more cuter too ^_^).

As I said in an earlier post, AKBingo! is show that features AKB48. It's really a fun show to watch even if I don't understand 99% of what they're saying. I just watch and figure it out. Later in the week I find a summary and re-watch the show with it.

My top 3 AKB48 songs: Bird, Bingo!, and Oogoe Diamond.
My favorite AKB48 members:

Oshima Yuko (Team K),


Takahashi Minami (Team A),


and Kasai Tomomi (Team K, but moving to Team B in Oct)

Lunch today -> Chinese Food

Went to Rideau Restaurant for lunch today. I haven't been there in awhile. Went with my good friend Julie and buddy James. Mark, Minus One, and Friend1yFire were suppose to go too, but bailed out with lame excuses :) We ordered Schezuwan Beef (everyones favorite default dish), Singapore Style Vermicelli, and Salt & Pepper Squid. The food was great and fast. In my opinion, Rideau Restaurant is my pick for the best Chinese restaurant in the city.
FYI: almost died on the way back from the restaurant. I blame it on our crazy lead-footed driver :)

Scribblenauts

Bought "Scribblenauts" today for the DS. Pretty good game. The object is to solve the puzzle on each level and get the starite (star). You do this by moving your guy around and writing in tools/weapons/things for him to use. ie Make an axe to cut down a tree to get the star at the top.

Its interesting how the things you create interact with you and each other. Here's a little chain of events of when I was experimenting in the free-play area, where you can make anything you want:
- I created a Cow and a Sword.
- Equiped the Sword and killed the Cow.
- The Cow turns into Meat.
- I created a BBQ to cook the Meat into Steak.
- Then I made a Clown. The Clown walked over stole and ate my Steak!
- The REALLY cool part is that afterwords I create a Vampire.
- The Vampire attacked the Clown and turned him into an Undead Minion!!
- Guess what. Then they BOTH attacked me!!!
- What makes it awesome is that Vampire Hunter is a noun in the game (he's equipped with a stake too) I make one to try and kill both of them. Didn't work... they overpowered the Vampire Hunter and he became another Undead Minion too.
- I then made the Sun to kill the Vampire and he turns into a pile of Dust.
- I made a Dragon to kill the Undead Minions. Of course after that, the Dragon turned on me, so I made a couple of Knights and a Mage to help me kill Dragon.
- During the fight with the Dragon I accidentally hit the Mage with my sword, so he attacked me too (the Mage shoots mini-fireballs from his staff)!
- Then I typed in Meteor, dragged and dropped it to crush the Mage. Apparently Meteor destroys the whole level when it hits and kills me too. I should have just made a Car and ran the Mage over. LOL

This game is really neat that it knows so many different words. Everyone should try it out.
BTW: the Ghost is uber-powerful. The only way I could kill it was with Holy Water.

"Fong" Character

Small project I completed during my vacation. I got some window shading film and carved out the chinese character for "Fong" into it. My buddy made the template I used from a small Fong character my mom gave me (Thanks Peter).
Here's the final result:

I think it looks pretty cool.

Gyoza

One of my favorite japanese shows I watch every week is AKBingo! It's a variety show that stars the Jpop Idol group AKB48. In the 2009-09-02 episode: the girls break into 2 teams and have a competition to make Gyoza. It looked pretty good and I decided to make some myself. Problem was that I didn't know exactly what some of the ingredients were, because the show is in Japanese. So I asked my best friend's wife to watch the show and translate the "correct" ingredients for me (Thanks Emi).

My results:



Wreckgar enjoys them too. :)

If you visit Emi's blog, you can see the gyoza that Gavin and Emi made on the weekend too. (FYI the site is japanese)
http://ameblo.jp/e-mita/
BTW: Gavin, the single gyoza you made looks pretty pitiful :)

Laziness and Back to Work...

Just created this blog. I was planning to create a blog a few weeks ago while I was on vacation, but it didn't happen. I was lazy and kept putting it off. I'm not exactly sure where all the time went, but it was a relaxing vacation.

Today was the my 1st day back to work at CMC from my vacation. I finished my work on the CP140 project before leaving for vacation, and today I'm on a new project. I'm going to be writing and running manual test cases (I think?).

Anyways, welcome to Fongpay's Universe.