Sam's Blog

My friend, Alison, from home wrote me the sweetest email. And I realized that we are indeed going to be friends until we are old and gray. Why not? No reason not to. We have been friends since junior high and though she lives in Davis, we still talk all of the time. It's great and I love it, a lot.

The holidays are a strange time for me. The home that I would go back to isn't the one that I grew up in. I no longer have a home in Modesto and it saddens me that I will never ever be able to go back to it. I still get lost in Bellflower (where my dad and siblings reside) and it doesn't feel like home at all. I use to go there frequently, but lately I've been slacking. It's only 45 minutes away, so I feel as though I can go there anytime, but yet I do not. My family is not big on holidays so I don't feel a need to have to go there on the holidays. But I do plan to go sometime this weekend. I miss my dad and grandma a lot. I no longer have a room of my own and it's such a foreign place to me now. I don't know if I will ever get use to it. I don't know where any of the local hangouts are or even the best coffee shop in the area. Maybe I should stay there for a while and explore. But a part of me doesn't care. I know Ventura (where Josh is from) better than I do Bellflower and Monterey Park (where my mom lives). Crazy, but true. But I am starting to get use to my new apartment and it feels like home to me, so to me, that's all I really need. It's weird to come back to my old apartment (Lisa and I are cooking Thanksgiving dinner for a few friends) again and though I only lived there for a year, I am more comfortable in it than any other place. Even though my room looks totally different with Justin's stuff in there, it feels soothing. It's nice to spend Thanksgiving day here. I wouldn't want it any other way.

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The past few days have been a whirlwind of activities. Everyday of work has been crazy because of the holiday. I didn't get much sleep all week because I was actually doing things after work.

On Monday, I went out for sushi with Aussie, Lisa, and Josh to Niko Niko (right across the street from Trader Joe's on Westwood). They have great happy hour specials. We ate tons of sushi and tempura and talked for hours. I was a bit irritated because I ordered a Coke and waited around for a refill for the longest time. I was thirsty because of the sushi and soy sauce and talking. The waitress finally came by and gave me a glass of water and explained that refills cost extra and she gave me a glass of water and walked away. I was thinking that it wasn't fair because what if I wanted to pay extra for the refill? I really didn't care, but since she took that option away from me, I was stuck with water. But I drank it anyway and didn't raise a fuss.

Tuesday night started off a bit slower. Angela and I had dinner at Barney's Gourmet Hamburgers because she was craving a burger. I love that place and they have the best burgers ever. Angela became a quick fan of it too. Josh called and said that Greg, his best friend, was in town from Texas. Yay! We met up with him, Negin (his fiance), Wen, and Kurt at Real Food Daily. All but Wen are vegan. I had a Kombucha Wonder Drink that made me urinate every 10 minutes. It tasted like ginger and asian pear and was very acidic. Left a weird aftertaste in my mouth. Afterwards, we went to karaoke at the Peppermint. It's been a long time since I've been karaoking. It was fun and it irritated my throat. It was nice seeing Kurt, who was against karaoking in the first place, sing along to songs like "Whip It!" and "Living on a Prayer" and "Beautiful Day." I know that people deep down inside love to karaoke, but they will never admit it.

Andrea was back in town on Wednesday and wanted to check out Saddle Ranch in Universal City. Even though we went there last Saturday, I decided to go so I can enjoy the experience with her. Well, apparently they have a live band on Wednesday nights instead of a DJ. The band wasn't very good either. They did a lame cover of "Last Dance with Mary Jane" and that's when we knew that we had to leave. We went to No Bar in North Hollywood instead and it was a cool place. Interesting people (a lot from the Valley) and bad music (from the jukebox). But we had fun. We chilled and people watched. It was nice to see Andrea again. I've missed her so much and she apparently missed us a lot as well because the people in Denver are very different, according to her.

Today was a success. Dinner was awesome. The best mashed potatoes I've ever tasted (thanks to Lisa) and Henri's ham was excellent as well. Green beans with bacon was surprisingly sweet and lovely. It was fun! I love turkey.