I am feeling kind of puny. Caught a little bug. We had a great weekend and I am in the recovery phase. We got together with a bunch of our gang and went out to dinner Saturday night at Peking Wok in Bonsall. We decided to let Leslie order for the table and it worked out perfectly.
We started the meal with the imperial seafood soup, which is sublime. Fragrant, a symphony of textures, spicy, the tiny bits of seafood exploded on my taste buds. Best I have had there and the few of our compatriots who had never tried it were wowed. We then had the hot chili dumplings appetizer and their notoriously good lettuce cups. All great. The entrees started arriving fast and with mechanical precision. Walnut shrimp, colored green from their unusual wasabi bath, Yu Shang chicken, Szechan lamb, another shrimp dish called lover's shrimp that Renee suggested. Really great meal, although we probably got a bit loud. A few of our party had the saki rice for dessert, which is a bit powerful for me. Peking Wok is a very nice chinese restaurant.
Afterwards we retired to R & D's place for a nightcap. Our friend is a mechanical wizard and one of his many hobbies is building 1/8th scale working trains in his fully equipped machine shop. Jim was blown away as was I when I originally saw these metal masterpieces, close to being fully operational. Our buddies have one of those new three dimensional Samsung televisions with the special battery operated glasses. I was shocked at how good the technology has become.
It is such a pleasure to have such a great group of friends in my life as I do.
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Yesterday I tried to catch a hummingbird drinking cactus nectar with my Nikon with little success. They just don't like to cooperate. We ended up meeting Renee and friend Jim for brunch at Le Bistro, Janis being out of town. Afterwards we stopped by our friend Melanie's to meet her new rescued anatolian shepherd. She recently lost her longtime pal Shmoozer. Then we stopped by Bill and Jean's to say hi, Jean just got out of surgery. We toodled over to Renee's, where she had made a sick cold cut and cheese spread and we hung out by her pool for the afternoon. A huge hawk was screaming from the treetops and we entered full relax and chill mode.
I include a picture of the skull over the cemetery door, that was actually installed during one of the earliest Zorro movies, I believe the Californian. Life following art, they decided to leave it.
It is a very peaceful site and there was a large fiesta taking place which was we wandered over to. Lots of hispanic people celebrating their culture peacefully and happily. Nothing but great vibes.
A couple guys came in wearing their fancy embroidered shirts and sunday best boots dressed like proud peacocks. There are a lot of hispanics in my town and I am impressed that they always have a sparkling set of duds for church and special occasions, which they treat with reverence. We were a pair of the very few gringos there but never felt unwelcome.
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We bopped over to the beach for a walk and a spectacular sunset. Found Mediatech and ran into my old pal Lance Jost, the Laguna Beach artist and his wife Donna and brother in law legendary surfer Mike Hynson. Saw Mark, the original guitar player for the Chocolate Watchband. Very impressive facility, good food.
I had nothing left in the tank, went home to crash and burn. Need another weekend to restore.
