Clean Sweep

Wow. Saturday I went to lab for a few hours. During that time, Yilin did something that no woman other than my mother has done: my laundry. She did about 4 or 5 loads. She then went through ALL of my clothing, sorting it into what stays (separate piles for 'regular clothes', 'gym clothes', and 'climbing/camping clothes') and what goes. When I came back from lab and saw this, I was amazed, impressed, and very grateful. Although this was a Christmas present to her, it benefits me as well (this is definitely something that I've wanted to do for a while now).

This is what is being gotten rid of:

• 32 shirts
• 11 pairs of pants
• 2 pairs of shorts
• 4 pairs of underwear
• 6 pairs of socks (+9 orphans)

I still have that total volume of clothing that I am keeping. Although, by "volume" I mean "actual physical volume", as the distributions are skewed away from pants toward socks and underwear; shirts is probably about the same. Of course, I still have to actually discard the clothing. That is the final committing step.

We then went to Chinatown to do some grocery shopping. We picked up some crazy giant Chinese grapefruit-like thing (I only know the name in Mandarin Chinese, and don't even know how to transliterate it, so I won't), a persimmon, a Chinese pear, Meat, and all sorts of other goodies.

Grocery shopping in Chinatown is a lot of fun. You really never know what sort of incredible "food" you are going to see. Upon seeing something I never even knew existed I immediately ask Yilin, "Have you had this and is it any good?"

We then went to dinner at Sweet-n-Tart, a place that is labelled as 'Dim Sum' by CitySearch, but is not actually that type of restaurant. You can read my review here.

We then went back to Yilin's place. We ate this giant grapefruit. Yilin told me, as she was cutting the peel off in a specific manner,

"You know, every kid in Taiwan likes to wear the peel of this fruit on their head. They all do. And now you have to."

With that, she placed this fruity helmet upon my head. I am not sure if she was telling me the truth, or just wanted me to post a photo of this on my blog. You decide.

We then prepared food for a Thanksgiving Feast we were attending Sunday at Angela Christiano's house. Angela is Hyunmi and Katie's academic advisor. She always invites me to their lab Happy Hour and any lab events. Who am I to turn down free food and beer?

The stipulation of attending Angela's Thanksgiving feast is that you must bring a dish from "your country of origin". Being the European mutt that I am, and as American as one could get, in a sense, I brought homemade chocolate chip cookies. Nestle Tollhouse for the win!

Yilin made a Chinese dish that is like a cold cut. It's a specific cut of beef marinated/simmered for an hour in a wine/anise sauce and then marinated/cooled overnight in the fridge. In the morning it is cut into thin slices and covered with a bit of the sauce and allowed to warm to room temperature. Yes, it is darn tasty.

Sunday morning we went to breakfast at Claude's. I suppose I could link my earlier review here, but it's moot: Claude still rules the world of French pastry with an iron fist.

In the afternoon we met up with a slew of people attending Angela's party and rode in the van to Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, where her new house resides. Concerning the house, all I will say is that the master bathroom is nearly half the size of my apartment. Honestly. (Her new house is amazing.)

The party was a lot of fun, and as per The Official Rules of Thanksgiving, I stuffed myself stupid. Oh, glorious day of thanks! Yilin's dish went over really well; it was one of the few that was totally finished. (There are so many dishes that not all of them can possibly get eaten.)

We got back to Manhattan early enough to vegetate for a while, digesting the day's intake of food, alcohol, and sugar. You can view a photo slideshow here.