Wicked the Musical

Spent a lot of time driving last week. I took Wednesday off work and drove in to St Louis on Tuesday night to get fingerprinted yet again on Wed afternoon. I was applying for my EAD card and apparently every new document requires a new set of fingerprints. Went to dinner with bunch of people (Dave, Wes, James, Nick F, Clint, Jimmy, Ryan Applebees, Dwane and me) at McGurks. After dinner we just hung out at Daves. The next day I pretty much got fingerprinted and hung out with Dwane and drove back.

Worked Thurs and 1/2 day on Friday and then drove back again for Wicked on Friday night 8pm. We had bought tickets couple months back so we were all very excited. Carrie and I were supposed to go together but she wasn't feeling well so Nick F went in place of her. The show was at the St Louis Fox Theatre and I must admit, it was a gorgeous theatre. The theme of that building was Siamese Byzantine which I thought was interesting. There were very detail and ornate decorations all over and the inside was huge. Ryan, James, Dwane and I all got dressed up and went together. The show lasted for over two hours and I must say this is probably one of the best Musicals I've seen. It was witty, funny and had a great twist of story line adapted from the classic movie, The Wizard of Oz. I only wished I've seen the movie before the play as there were many references made because this musical was kind of a prequel to the movie with minor changes/adaptations. After the musical, we went to South City Diner and had a late, late dinner and pretty much went home and crashed.

The next day, we woke up to snow and more snow. We stayed in most of the day and tried to stay warm by drinking lots of tea and played a game of Scrabble with Wes and Dave over breakfast. Later Ryan, James and I went to dinner at California Pizza Kitchen and then watched I Am Legend, which turned out to be a really entertaining movie. After the movie, we found more snow (it snowed a total of 6-8" throughout the day in both StL and Col) and made a really slow ride home due to slick roads and stupid drivers. We got back and all of us started playing a game of Monopoly which turned out to be incredible fun. It was fun to see how everyone got to be sneaky, conniving, catty and mean. Initial alliances between Dave and me was a sure win against Wes, Ryan and James but later Dave decided to turn on me, so I recruited the other team and we proved to be victorious. We ended up playing till 5am which reminded me very much of the time when I was a young boy and stayed up late to play board games such as Monopoly and Risk with my brothers and childhood friends. It really brought back and added great memories for me. Sunday we all had lunch at Joanie's and I hung out for a little longer and headed home to Columbia.

This week is the final work week for the 2007! It's scary how fast this year has flown by. I have a feeling 2008 will be filled with many new challenges. I will be heading to New York City (for the 3rd time this year) a week from today on Xmas eve with Beau and then returning New Year's Eve to celebrate with the StL crew. I'm really looking forward to this trip, hopefully it won't be too cold. I'd like to maybe check out Atlantic City, Boston or DC. It's another total last minute trip, we bought the tickets on Friday! And it only cost us $109!!! ($160 after taxes and fees). The next time you hear from me will probably be after my NY trip and I promise to post lots and lots of pictures :)

HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!!!

Xmas

Merry Xmas! We're downtown lookin at window displays and enjoying free food, Yummy!!

Thanksgiving

I'm sorry for not updating for almost a month now. I have just been busy and this whole cold weather thing is just so depressing. The few weekends before Thanksgiving were spent doing nothing too interesting but hanging around with Beau and Chadd in Columbia. The weekend before Thanksgiving, I drove in to StL for James & Nick's Thanksgiving party. I left right after work Friday. Soon upon arriving, a bunch of us went to a condo launch party hosted by Tony's boss' who does real estate development on the side at Compton Heights or Gates, I can't remember. The party was pretty cool, open bar with free food and performances by a string quartet and a belly dancer *Gasp*. After the party, we went to Novak's and had a ball, met Dallas who was fun. The next day, Dave and I pretty much did nothing and yet we were late to the Thanksgiving party. Nick cooked up a storm with the highlight (for me at least) being the pepper ice cream. The rest were standard Thanksgiving stuff (turkey, stuffing...etc). We stayed in that night and the next morning, we all went to DimSum. Everyone enjoyed the experience except for Dave who pouted pretty much the whole day. After that, I visited Michael (Nestle) and Ryan and drove home after that.

The following week was really nice as I only had to work 3 days. Thursday (Turkey Day); Justin, Chadd and I went to Mark (Justin's boss) and Kevin's house for dinner. Sam (Justin's coworker) was there too. After dinner, we played some board games and left. They were really nice people and had a pretty nice house. I guess the funeral business is lucrative :) Later that night, Beau, Chadd and I went to watch Beowolf at the theaters and I must say, I did not enjoy this movie at all except for a short scene when Beowolf strips naked to fight Grendel ;) Friday I went shopping with Chadd and later that night played Sequence (more board games!) with Chadd and Beau. The next day, I drove in to StL where I hung out briefly with Patricio then had dinner with James at 1111; which is a really good restaurant. I had rabbit :D and after dinner went to The Chocolate Bar which is kinda cool. After that, we went to Freddy's to meet up with Dave&Wes, Dwane, Michael etc. We partied at Novaks again and totally shut the place down. Sunday, we (James, Dave & me) hung out most of the day and I had dinner with James & Ryan at Macaroni Grill. After dinner, I did some research before my 2nd interview which went pretty well. Now I guess I'll just have to wait and see what happens. Will keep you all posted if I hear anything. I hope everyone had a good Turkey celebration!

Goblet of Fire

Man this is definitely the longest HP book I've read so far. It feels like it's taken forever to finish -- 734 whomping willow pages! Lately I've been making many HP references, I hope my non-HP reader friends will forgive me :) Like the other day, I described some person I knew as having a Hermione hairday. So the big news couple weeks ago was JK Rowling revealing that Dumbledore's gay! Well of course he is, who else but a queen would use "lemon drop" as a password to his office, LOL!

Well I'm finally done with this book! Just like the last few, it was really good, I can't believe I didn't read HP series much earlier. Somewhere along the middle, this book got a little slow but the end was great and I liked how everything tied together and it all made sense. This book is definitely setting up the scene for the great Voldermort to go all out and declare war. I especially liked how in the end of the book, Dumbledore went into aggressive mode and started giving everyone instructions in preparation of what is about to happen. Now it's time for me to go get Goblet of Fire, the movie eventhough I just recently watched it with Chadd. I have also gone to the library and picked me up the next book Order of the Phoenix. Woo hoo...can't wait :)

Boo, Happy Halloween guys! I didn't do much this past weekend, just rested and stayed home mostly. Gym on Saturday morning and later that night watched 30 Days of Night, starring Josh Hartnett. It had been out for about a week, so the theater wasn't too busy. It was a pretty good movie, a little too gory for my taste but it's good compared to a lot of the scary movies lately. After the movie, we (Chadd, Beau and me) went to Houlihan's for dinner and it happened to be happy hour and it was half off drinks and $5 appetizers. We had a feast and the bill only came up to be about $10/person. It was awesome! Will definitely have to do it again. Sunday, I stayed in all day, did some cooking and cleaning. It was nice after the last few hectic weekends I've been having.

Homecoming 2007

This past weekend turned out really well...really well indeed. Beau and I skipped gym and went to the mall instead to help Justin buy some new shoes. James and Scott came in on Friday night and together with Carrie, me, Beau, Justin, Colin and Cynthia we had a late dinner at Addison's. Ryan and Nick came in later that night. I haven't seen Justin all week long so he gave me my birthday present (a digital photoframe, awesome!) that he split with Dave. It was good catching up with Scott (last time I saw him was last year's Homecoming!). Speaking of Homecoming, I just found out that MU is where the tradition of Homecoming started, pretty cool fact. Anyway after dinner we walked to the Penguin bar and as soon as we got in, we were doing shots. The yaeger shots were ok but the one that really screwed me up was the Irish Car bomb. We all got so drunk that night as you can see from the slide show. Beau had to drive me home and take my car home with him that night!

The next morning we all got up early for the Parade. We were all amazingly perky, especially after a night of partying and getting drunk. After the parade, we had lunch at Shakespeares and followed by the football game (thanks to Beau for getting Justin, Chadd and me tickets!). The weather by the way on both Saturday and Sunday was a beautiful 70-80 degrees! The football got boring as we were kicking Texas Tech's butt and we decided to leave after half time. Later that night we went out to Deuce and then later Tellers. I got to meet up with Don and Jesse. The next morning we had brunch at Ernies as usual and then later went to watch Elizabeth: The Golden Age with Chadd and Beau. Movie was pretty good, Cate did a great job portraying the Queen. After that, I just pretty much relaxed and got my mind ready for work.

My dirty Thirty!

What a weekend!

We (Beau, Chadd, KK and me) drove in right after work on Friday and directly to Zoe for dinner. The food was pretty good and they had a great atmosphere. Ten of my good friends (Dave, Wes, James, Carrie, Chadd, Beau, KK, Dwane, Patricio and Matt) came to dinner that night. Food was great and so was the dinner conversation. The guys got the usual DQ ice cream cake and that was great! After dinner, we went to Novaks and had a lot of fun.

The next day, we spent most of the day buying and preparing for the party. The party turned out to be a big success, about 50-60 people showed up and Dave's place was completely trashed but we helped clean up the next morning. I'm so glad Egwin and Rachel drove in from KC and my coworker Kelly drove in from Jeff City.

Sunday we just cleaned up, went out for brunch and pretty much drove home after that. Weather was great so Beau and me went out for a little 3 mile run and later that night, I just relaxed and watched DH and B&S.

Dwane's visit

Dwane from St Louis decided to come visit Columbia for the first time. He took the train down Saturday, went to get him and then decided to give the Capital building a tour. The building was totally cool, unfortunately that's about the only cool thing about Jefferson City. After walking around enjoying the beautiful fountains and statues, we came back to Columbia for lunch where we had very yummy beef pho. After lunch we walked around downtown, the weather was just amazing the entire weekend. Later that evening Dwane, Beau and me had dinner at Murry's, the food was very good. After dinner, we checked out some of the bars including Arches, On the Rocks and Shattered. The next day, we had Shakespeare's for pizza and then went to the local Art Festival. Pretty much stayed in for most of the evening where I cooked dinner and watched Sunday night TV. Monday, I worked half day and came back and hung out for a little more and then drove him back to the train station. So that's pretty much it for the weekend. It was fun and Dwane got to see Columbia for the first time.

Prisoner of Azkaban

I just got done reading and watching this title! I am now officially a HP fan! I have immediately started reading Year four: Goblet of Fire. The book was absolutely astonishing but I was a little let down by the movie. The book was full of details and did an excellent job at expanding on the three favourite characters; Hermione, Ron and Harry. The end, like the first two books, were also filled with twists and turns, revealing the good from the dark side. I thought the first two movies followed the book pretty closely but left out a few minor details but for Year three, the movie decided to leave out, sometimes even changing certain plots from the book. The movie was still entertaining but in my opinion absolutely cannot be compared to the book. Like how the movie completely left out why Black, Potter and Pettigrew became learned how to become an Animagus. It was because they were very compassionate of Lupin's condition and wanted to keep him company during his transformation. They were best of friends, just like Hermione, Ron and Harry. The movie also completely left out the second quidditch match, where Harry rode his Firebolt, that won Griffindor the cup. Another character development that was left out was how Snape was almost killed by a prank only to be rescued by Potter but suspected him of causing it all to begin with, therefore the huge hatred Snape has for Harry. Ok enough HP for now.

So the last two weekends, I didn't really do anything or go anywhere. The first of the two, Joe and James + Nick came in to town to visit. It was really good seeing Joe again after about a year. He seems to be doing well and liking his new life in Michigan. We spent quite a lot of quality time together and that was nice. James + Nick drove in to attend a wedding. Last weekend, was beautiful, weather wise. I just hung out downtown with my book and laptop for majority of the day. Tried going out on Fri and Sat nights but just getting tired of the scene here. I spent three whole hours washing and waxing my car on Sunday, so much for lazy Sunday afternoon!

Chicago

I was really excited as I had been looking forward to labor day weekend for quite a while. I headed for St Louis pretty much right after work on Friday and got in at around 7pm, the traffic was bad. Interstate 70 came to a complete stop several times for no apparent reason whatsoever, just stupid drivers I guess. Driving in, I was sure the trip to Chicago would have been cancelled since we had not secured a hotel room but soon after I arrived, Patricio made a reservation at Hotel Cass (Holiday Inn Express) at the heart of Magnificent Mile. That night we (Dave, Patricio, Applebee's Ryan, Dwane and me) had dinner at Maggiano's and then later met Nestle guy at Freddy's and H2+Mas at Novak's. I had so much fun but the weekend had just started. Spent the night at Dwane's that night, Angel's loft is really nice!

The next day, got to Dave's bright and early but we didn't leave for Chicago till about noon because Patricio's tire blew out. On the way up, we had some really strange but serious conversations, topics ranged from religion to phylosophy to sexuality. It was interesting though and made the drive go by very quickly. Before we knew it, we were there. It's been 3 or 4 years since I've last visited Chicago, the tall buildings and large crowds immediately reminded me of my recent trip to NYC. We checked into our Hotel Cass and signed up for valet parking eventhough Dave was against the idea but it just made life easier. We walked around Mich Ave for a awhile and later met up with Elliot and Bill for dinner. After dinner, we took the cab down to boys' town and went to Sidetracks, Roscoes' and then later Hydrate.

The next day, I got up and left the two boys still sleeping and went to have brunch with Elliot and Bill. We all later met up again and walked around visiting tourist sites; Libraries, fountains and of course the bean. That night, we had dinner at the Grand Lux Cafe (apprently operated by the same people as Cheesecake Factory) and then skipped out on Bill's cousin's party. Dave and I took the train down to Boys' town while Patricio stayed back to study for the MCAT. We didn't party too hard, just checked out all of the bars and got home at a decent hour. Monday was check out day. We paid our bill and took the train down to Chinatown where we got to enjoy some Malaysian cuisine and walked around. Dave and Patricio seemed to like the chinese bakeries very much. We left Chicago around 5pm and got back to St Louis at around 11pm, where I immediately got back on the road heading back to Columbia. I finally made it home at around 1am, but on the way, around where HWY 40 meets I-70, I got my first ever speeding ticket in Missouri. Fortunately, I know an attorney so Dave's trying to get it fixed, I'm keeping my fingers crossed....

Books and more

I just finished reading the book AND watching the movie. As always the book is much better but I must say the movie follows the book very closely. Certain scenes that I thought had been cut out were in the deleted scenes section instead. I read somewhere that JK Rowling refused to give up control of the films to some Hollywood executive, so she's still very much in control. I guess I'm still obsessed with Harry Potter :) Moving on to book number three, Prisoner of Azkaban. Derrick from work loaned me this book as it was taking forever to get them from the library.

This past weekend was spent recuperating from a cold. I'm actually still sniffling and coughing as I'm typing. Went to the Roots and Blues festival with Beau on Friday after gym. Saturday I had lunch with Justin and hung out with him and Chadd the majority of the day. Justin cooked dinner and then we watched couple of scary movies. They were dumb. That night I took two Benadryls and slept for almost 12 hours. I could have slept more if I hadn't made plans to meet Chadd and Justin at Ernie's for brunch. Watched Chamber of Secrets with Chadd and then later played some tennis with Justin. That's pretty much all I did for the weekend. Mainly resting from the labor day weekend before where I had gone to Chicago with Dave and Patricio. Anyway I'll have another entry for that soon with pictures :)