why not having cable might be not that bad...

I have cable. Of course. I couldn't live without the food network (which a lot of the time I don't even watch, it's just on as my soothing background noise) or bravo or jon stewart. The boyfriend (who I will now refer to from here on as Hottie McHotterson, or McH for short) does not have cable. However, this makes him very loyal to the few shows he actually can watch, such as Hell's Kitchen and better yet, Check, Please!
Now, I'm generally not a quiet person. Okay, that's not true, I'm inherently asian enough that one could describe me as quiet. But if I feel comfortable enough around you I'll tell you anything. In fact, it becomes hard to shut me up. And most of the time I'll talk about food. I think this intimidates people who aren't so "into" food. Numerous times I have found myself choosing the restaurant or even the dishes we order because I'm "into" food. Not McH. From our very first date he's never been shy about suggesting a place or a dish to try. For some reason I find this very attractive. But I digress. When we decided to go out to a nice dinner to celebrate a quarter-year's time of dating and still liking each other, he suggested Antica Trattoria, having seen it reviewed on Check, Please!
Because I have cable, I don't think I would ever watch that show. But I'm soooo glad he does. Because Antica Trattoria was pretty much the *perfect* place for us to have our celebratory dinner. Everything was delicious (or "yummy" as we kept getting asked by the server and the hostess) and the atmosphere was great - cute, small, not too quiet or loud, and full of other people who were clearly enjoying themselves. We started with beef carpaccio and a porcini mushroom salad - this salad was amazing. Crack crack crack. We each had pasta (wild boar for me, squid ink angel hair for him) because now that we've been dating for more than two months we can eat pasta in front of each other. Ha ha, remember in high school when your friends told you to never go to an italian restaurant on your first date because of the potential for food/sauce-related embarrasing mishaps? Or that if you had to go, order something like tortellini. No? Okay, maybe that was just me. We finished with the tiramisu, which is one of his favorite desserts. Again, "yummy." (We found it slightly amusing that all these serious-seeming people kept throwing the word "yummy" at us.)
Hm, I wonder where we'll go to celebrate four months...

so so hot...

Originally uploaded by starchmouse.

I'm sure most of you in the bay area know how sweltering it was this past weekend. I just moved into a larger room in my apartment that has its very own deck! So I've been taking advantage of the sunshine and eating my breakfast outside. Yum - steel cut oats cooked in my rice cooker with blueberries, flax, and bananas.