Back to the Stone Age

While I was starting my P90X workout yesterday, the lights and TV started to flicker a bit, and then the TV turned off while the lights remained.  No problem I thought…just have to boot up the PC again and keep on going (I have my PC connected to the TV to display the video and the PC powered off during the power surge).  I pressed the power button, but no lights or fans started spinning.  I pressed it again and again, but nothing.  I unplugged the PC, plugged it back in, and still nothing.  At this point, I was starting to think about the angry things I was going to say to the apartment front office about breaking my new PC when I walked around the apartment and noticed that the fridge had also ceased to make any sounds and the microwave lighting was quite a bit dimmer than usual.  So I got the new kill-a-watt meter that I had recently bought and started testing several plugs around the TV room and found some interesting readings.

So apparently the plugs in the TV room and kitchen were reading around 60 something volts AC, which is pretty much half of what a normal 120V AC output should be.  Interestingly enough, the bathroom and my bedroom seemed unaffected by the power surge as all the lights were bright as usual.

After getting some busy tones trying to call up emergency maintenance, I finally got through, and the maintenance person said that the power had indeed gone out and the apartments were running on the backup generators, and they were working as fast as they could to get things back to normal.  At this point, I really couldn’t complain since there wasn’t much I could do.  Unfortunately, there were some people that were stuck in the elevator during the power outage, and the local fireman had to be called in to rescue them, so I’m sure they’re going to give the management office an earful after this.

On the other hand, earlier in the day I enjoyed a good Korean BBQ buffet lunch over at IlMee’s.

Mmmm…dessert

My coworker and I went to Rosa Mexicano for lunch yesterday, and we had a nice 3 course lunch since it’s Restaurant Week over at National Harbor.  But the highlight definitely had to be the dessert as I had the most delicious cupcake I’ve ever had.

You know you want to eat it just from looking at it ;)

The Official Snack of the Veggies

I was walking through Costco this weekend picking up some odds and ends, and I saw this bag sitting in the aisle, and I knew right then and there I had to buy it.

What’re these like?  Well, imagine the taste of a french fry with the crunch and weight of a potato chip, and you get the veggie straw.  Even though the bag highlights that these have 30% less fat than regular potato chips, I can imagine someone easily eat 30% more since these are soooo good.

New Furniture

I have a pretty sturdy dining room table, but the chairs that I have are definitely on their last legs since the legs look like they might fall out at any moment.  So yesterday, I made a run to Ikea to see if I can find some new chairs for my table.  I sat on a few and was initially set on picking up a set of four Börje chairs, but then I saw the nifty looking Granås glass/metal table set WITH four chairs for less than the four Börje chairs.  After some debate with my parents, I decided that the deal was too good to pass up and picked up the Granås along with four Rivta seat cushions since the metal chairs were a bit stiff.  I also picked up a Karsten office chair with arms since the fake leather/plastic on my old one was starting to peel apart and the cushioning on it wasn’t cushy anymore.  The new table set looks good in the apartment, and my butt’s thanking me for the new office chair :P

As for food this weekend, my parents and I went to Mark’s Duck Palace since we’ve heard that they’re the only dim sum place nearby, and boy, the restaurant was PACKED like a NYC dim sum restaurant, but it was easy to see why since the dim sum was top notch.  Mark’s Duck House will definitely have to be a VO DC restaurant destination.

Piano Hero Challenge

Ever since getting the digital piano for Christmas, I’ve been trying to practice my way back in to some sort of decent piano-playing form.  Kira suggested that I try to learn Yiruma’s “River Flows in You”.  I hadn’t heard this song before, so I went to Youtube to find some clips of what it sounds like, and while it sound intricate to play, I don’t think it’s overly impossible to learn.

Some further searching on Youtube landed me this video that lays out all the notes for you to “River Flows in You” in a Guitar Hero/Rock Bandish format.

So far, I can keep up with the right hand, but it’s been difficult to hone in on the left hand, but I’ll keep at it and see how far I can get.

Next Evolution of Guitar Hero

The name might sound cheesy (YouRock Guitar), but from the article I read here, it looks like a pretty ingenious device for those who are ready to graduate from the plastic colored-button guitar and move up to a real guitar.

I might have an incentive to learn guitar by myself now!

Cesar’s Diner

With the move to Alexandria, I have a wider choices of restaurants available to me compared to at Aberdeen, which one of my coworkers declared a cultural black hole.  King Street in Old Town Alexandria by itself offers a variety of potential choices as you can see below if you search for “restaurant” on Google Maps.  So in an attempt to try as many restaurants in and around Alexandria as I can, I've made myself a New Years Resolution “treat” to go to a different restaurant each weekend.

View Larger Map

I was craving breakfast food this morning, and I couldn’t find any diners with a quick search on King Street, so I headed up north to Arlington on 23rd Street to check out  Cesar’s Diner.  Although the reviews on Yelp made Cesar’s sound like it was hit or miss, I thought it was quite good if you’re coming in for breakfast.  The place was really packed when I drove by, and I thought I might have had trouble getting a table for myself, but they seated me pretty quickly at a booth for two.  I had thoughts of having pancakes, but the omelets sounded too good to pass up, so I ordered a bacon and mushroom omelet with a side of home fries.  Their home fries must be a popular item as one of the grills in the kitchen has its whole surface covered with chopped potatoes.  I also ordered a hot chocolate, which turned out to just be a packet of instant hot chocolate, but the extra whipped cream on the top was a nice touch.  For whatever reason, part of me was amused by the bendy straw that was served with my water, but it’s probably because I haven’t seen one in a while.

My omelet came out neatly rolled like a burrito accompanied by the home fries.  There was also a side of wheat toast not pictured.  It’s pretty typical of an omelet, but since I hadn’t had eggs in a while, this omelet was pretty darn good.  I’ll likely come back again to try their pancakes and waffles.