PHIL NGUYEN

I’ve been an absentee blog owner recently. There hasn’t been any legitimate reason for my brief hiatus, but I have been busy with real work (poker), fake work (bar scouting reports), and fun (too much). A rundown of things I’ve done this past week:

Monday: A friend of mine does PR work for restaurants. Part of the job description is going to various restaurants, sampling some of their best, and reviewing it. I was invited for a dessert tasting, and well, you know, I can’t turn down a free meal. This instance, we went to Olana. I ordered a chicken milanese sandwich as a small entry (can’t eat on an empty stomatch!), which was subpar, but we were there for the desserts so I can excuse that lapse in culinary judgement.

The first one we got was peaches and blueberries on polenta waffles with a side of blueberry ice cream. It was pretty good. There was a mixture of textures, from the smooth ice cream, to the dense, crumbliness of the polenta. The next dessert was a rhubarb strudel and that was absolutely fantastic. The pastry was wonderfully flaky, and the taste was just delicious. We got a fried ice cream ’smore, but that was easily the worst one. It was too heavy and there was a singular flavor that was too overpowering. We also got a cheese plate, which was standard as far as cheeses go.

Tuesday: I saw Jaguar Love (ex Blood Brothers and Pretty Girls Make Graves) at the Southpaw. Decent music doesn’t often come to this side of the slope, but the Southpaw houses some gems every once in a while.

You would think that I’d become exposed to new, rad music now that I live in the hipster capital of the world; well actually, a hop, skip, and jump away from said purgatory. But my once brazen ears have been musically sheltered. I am an endangered species. And soon, I will grow old and bald and be relegated to playing the Foo Fighters on repeat.

But ANYWAY, they were absolutely fantastic. I can see how their sound would be very hit or miss to some people - the singer’s voice is shrill and potent. But they are much more muted than their Blood Brother’s days, and they definitely put on a very fun live show. The two opening acts were really good, and I wish I remembered who they were.

EDIT: Stether’s remembers! They were called Kings of Left and the other was Beluga.

Wednesday: My knowledge of wine is pretty much zero. I don’t even know enough about it to be a novice or an amateur. But alas, I made my way to a Inoteca. I don’t think I made a fool out of myself, though I do feel like a girl ordering fruity, sweeter wines (read: blushes). But I must say that they tasted great, and I could get used to adding wine to my drinking repertoire. For various reasons, I feel somewhat important and older when I’m at a wine bar. It’s a stark contrast to drinking boxed Carlo Rossi and passing out in a bathroom during college.

I want to take this course at the French Culinary Institute. The price tag is kind of hefty ($995), and I’m not sure if I’m going to want to go to class at 8pm on a Wednesday night in December. The cold scares me. Why do I even live in the northeast? But still, I’m considering it. I’d learn a lot, and if I have plans to open a bar, I at least have to know the basics.

Thursday: Vegetarians united and we went to Vegetarian Palate for dinner. It wasn’t as good as I thought it was going to be, but it’s still a place I would return too. I ordered a mango chicken which was pretty good. And the table split vegetarian peking ribs (very good) and fried chicken bananas (not good, but then again, I don’t like ‘nanners).

Speaking of vegetarianism - I briefly experimented with it about a month ago. In total, I was a vegetarian for 13 days, which of course is a small sample. But I want to dispel this myth: a lot of people say that becoming a vegetarian makes you feel healthier. It’s kind of like an intangible thing that not many people can properly explain. They don’t say you gain more energy, or that you lose weight, it’s just some feeling. Well, I didn’t feel better. I felt much, much worse. Perhaps it was a lack of protein. Or maybe I just missed a medium rare steak. But I felt less responsive, and I had terrible, irregular stomach pains. That, more than the lack of meat, made me not want to be a vegetarian for any period of time.

BUT, I recently stumbled upon an advertisement for something that might have cured it - and something, I may get anyway: The Washlet. It’s not a toilet or a bidet, but a toilet seat attachment. And a hose-type device juts out, and washes your behind. Look at the demo. I think I’m crazy, but I think this might be the ultimate luxury.

Friday: I played poker for like six hours. I thought my brain was going to melt away into the long lost corridors of the sphinx.

One more thing: this is probably common knowledge to the internet-savvy crowd, but for the unaware, XKCD is seriously the best internet-comic ever. And this is coming from someone who loves dinosaurs and dinosaur comics. I want to post some of my favorite XKCD ones, but half the greatness lies in the alt tags, but you sort of have to be an computer geek to know what they are. Still, I may post them anyway.

Be Your Own Pet broke up. This is terribly disappointing news. I’ve been touting their record for a while now and they were going to play in Brooklyn next week. I thought they were one of the better female fronted bands.

They posted the set times for All Points West today. The only conflict for me is that Girl Talk and Andrew Bird go on the same time, and that is quite a tough decision.

Otherwise, my schedule is pretty much set:

2:30 - 3:15 The Go Team
4:00 - 4:45 Mates of State
5:00 - 6:00 New Pornographers (!)
Then I have a decision to make, or try to watch half of each
8:30 - 10:30 Radiohead

Saturday’s set times look pretty straightforward, and I’ll probably choose Animal Collective over Sia.

Another thing - I found this cool video of Rogue Wave performing “Lake Michigan” on some late night talk show. The video quality sucks, and the audio is probably worst but they are such a rad band. They kind of remind of the Arcade Fire with regards to how weird they are.

Previously, I have written in this dear piece of web real estate about my fondness for Feist, though I my iTunes playlist isn’t exactly littered with female soloists.

ANYWAY, she and Ron Sexsmith have a thing. Now, I don’t think it’s a Kate and I “thing” or ex thing - in fact, I suspect they are just friends that get drunk a lot, but I suppose those are the best friends to have. It is clear though they’ve had some sort of relationship (whether it’s strictly music, I am not privy, though the detective in me deduced that the “trouble” they refer to is something else). She covered his song, “Secret Heart.” And the name of his new album is called Exit Strategy of the Soul, which, oh, happens to be the name of one of her songs.

But the best thing they’ve done together is “Brandy Alexander.” The two apparently co-wrote the song during a drunken rendezvous one night. However, they are not identical songs. Hers is through her perspective and his is through his musical lens.

These are Sexsmith’s lyrics. And here are Feist’s.

Want to hear both songs? OK, I’ll make it easy for you. You can download Sexsmith’s song here. Feist’s “Brandy Alexander” can be found in the following YouTube clip.

As for which version I prefer? I enjoy Feist’s somber, albeit beautiful, rendition, but the optimistic side of me much prefers the naively delirious upbeat Sexsmith version. I also like horns a ton. And the extended alcohol / love / addiction metaphor. It’s just fantastic and properly reflects my current non-situation.

It’s an absolutely beautiful day outside today - it’s probably the nicest weather I’ve had at this dear old apartment of mine. I’m typing this entry on the terrace right now, pausing every couple of minutes to devour this delicious sandwich I’ve made: honey glazed turkey, monterey jack, and honey dijon mustard on country wheat bread with jalepeno-infused pickles on the side.

I’m also currently playing Jenna in Scrabble over Internet. Everyone has been buzzing over Scrabulous for the last year or so; but I’ve still been kicking it old school with ISC. Sure it doesn’t have the snazzy graphical interface or the cool sound effects, but the player base is smaller - and better. Anyway, I’ve been playing a very defensive Scrabble strategy recently with good results. I do feel like like I die a little inside every time I put down a ZA/AX combination. But defense wins championships, right?

So I didn’t get the iPhone 3G, which is probably surprising to some of you. I’m disappointed with Apple’s launch. There have been way too many bugs out of the gate: random freezing, yellow tinted displays, and problems with syncing to MobileMe. But what irks me even more is how a lot of the “features” aren’t even implemented yet. Push technology isn’t coming until September which is a total buzz kill. I was looking forward to having a mobile AIM, but without pushing, it’s useless. Apple hasn’t even released their mobile version of iChat yet. GPS doesn’t work properly yet, though third party companies like TomTom are trying develop software for that. And also, AT&T upped the monthly plans by $20 a month. But realistically, I will get one eventually because the urge is going to get me soon enough, but for now, no.

I’m going to see Spoon at Prospect Park in a few hours. I’m super jazzed for that. It should be fun.