it seemed convenient that the holiday no one wanted to talk about, least of all me, happened to occur on the same weekend of president’s day and lunar new year. i think it gave us all a certain degree of comfort, but still.
“good food and intellectual dialogue and a strenuous workout with minimal emotional distress.”
for the seventh year in a row, last friday was the collective birthday celebration of christian, stephanie and irene at Miyake in Palo Alto, best known for its sake bombing ritual and party-friendly atmosphere.
it’s remarkable to think that my college friends and i have been coming here for seven years straight, sometimes with a group big enough to fill the restaurant.
it’s now one of the few times during the year that i get to see all my college filipinos in one place. we’d been through a lot together in the Kasamahan filipino club back a the University of San Francisco, but our lives keep us apart more than ever before. engagements, babies, people moving away. we try.
i saw my brothers at the end of the night back at the Chili’s in san bruno. just like the other filipinos, i don’t see these ones together all that often, so the drive was worth it, even though the two previous dragon rolls didn’t leave any more room to eat.
the next day was week two of my third season of dragonboat at lake merced. more new faces, lots of optimism, a very familiar face and a relatively good practice ensued, though i did have my issues with the day’s particular coaching. ha, dragonboat drama…
that sunday was february 14. officially lunar new year and… that other thing. after a long morning on the books, i headed to the San Francisco Pillow Fight at justin herman plaza to take some pictures and likely run into some people.
i ended up finding diana and nikki and jay and anthony, and we watched the ensuing violence. let’s just say that some people have aggression issues, and it got scary at times, but the profusion of down feathers made the spectacle worth coming to.
afterward we headed into the mission for dinner and hookah, ending the night relatively early because i had to be up at 5am. still, i had the most intelligent february 14 i’ve ever had, technically i got to spend it with two women, and the whole day ended up being a lot more entertaining than i originally predicted it to be. win. win. win.
my president’s day involved driving brian to the airport at 5am, but McDonalds was offered (and accepted) as payment forthwith. i had a late afternoon run along embarcadero, followed by attempts at fine literature.
later on, Tarusan the older and I tried the locally vaunted carne asada and carnitas fries, respectively, though i still don’t find the endeavor particularly compelling.
good food and intellectual dialogue and a strenuous workout with minimal emotional distress, the last of which made the difference between this and last year.
a good weekend? sure.
