The trip consisted of walking around, walking into various random shops (selling foodstuffs), buying some specialty (artisan, organic, or whatnot) and overpriced foods, consuming them while enjoying the atmosphere, and chatting.  Things we ate were donuts and egg burritos.  We probably would've bought more and spent more money, if not for my bother pointing out the obvious: things were kind of expensive.  So, instead of spending money and buying food to eat, we just walked around a bit.  

My friend, Frank, appreciates old buildings.  I can sympathize, as it does seem that buildings were built with more thought and effort back then.  Of course, the ugly old buildings probably get destroyed without any notice, leaving only the beautiful ones still standing.  Still, doesn't this "ordinary" bank building look quite grand?  Also, this was the first trip where I busted out my phone (a recently upgraded Moto X) and began snapping photos in HDR.  I like the quality of these photos a lot.  Not DSLR quality, of course, but for something taken from a device that fits in my pocket, in a matter of seconds, it's not bad.

We came back, a week of sleep, work, eat, and vegetate happened.  Then, I went to L.A. with another friend (Joe), to help him take care of some business.

We arrived Friday, and counted T-shirts.  14 pallets worth of t-shirts.  Of course, we didn't actually count them.  We just inventoried them by counting the number of boxes with different size shirts.  

Then, we ate some good food with Joe's friends (mostly one friend who hung out with us most of the time and showed us around kinda, but sometimes with his other friends too).

This picture is special.  You can see Joe's friend, Lulu, who gave us recommendations of where to go and accompanied us most of the time.  We also had some interesting conversation.  Being in Texas, we don't feel it so much, but in California, there is an unpleasant reality.  As put by Lulu, in California, there really are two classes of people - one class come off the plane with suitcases with millions of dollars in them, buying houses flat out with cash, and overall living the good life.  Then, there's the other group who basically work at a job and probably can't afford to buy a house due to the rate at which house prices are increasing.  There is resentment in the air.  It is indeed a troublesome place to be in.  I'm glad I live in Texas where things seem to be more reasonable.

We also went hiking.  After eating all that, it would be kind of bad to not exercise at least a little.  I went a bit crazy with my phone, doing HDR and Panorama, at the same time! 

During this trip, we stayed at Joe's relatives' place.  Friday night, we stayed at his paternal Uncle's place.  This is the same uncle who is lending some of his warehouse space to store Joe's T-shirts.  When we ate together, Joe earned the nickname "小老頭", roughly translated as "little oldie", due to his ordering of warm water, instead of ice water.  Speaking of which, we ate at a sushi buffet, which was cheaper than a similar buffet in Dallas!

We also met Joe's family on his maternal side, including his grandma, his aunts, and his cousins.  They're a funny bunch, nice, good, and easy going.  His grandma is very straightforward, often times calling someone stupid.  It should be offensive, but for some unknown reason, no one gets offended.  It's the mysterious charm of a grandma, I suppose.  On the last day, we ate dim sum with her, and Joe and her fought over the bill in a hilarious manner.

The awesome part about the dim sum restaurant was that it was both good and cheap!  As opposed to Dallas, where different sized dishes cost different amounts, each dish in this restaurant costs the same (equivalent to a small dish in Dallas).  

Finally, I got to eat some real ramen.  It was 5 years ago when I had my first taste of real ramen, and it was at this restaurant.  I'm very happy I got to go again this time, and eat there.  It was good.

What made it even better was that I could request extra noodles for less than a buck (I refilled twice).  It made me very happy.

Finally, we got a sub-par foot massage for $15 (+ $5 tip).  Thumbs down.  We were really looking forward to it too.

And, so, the trip ended.  I came back, worked for two days, then went down to Austin to visit my brother over Thanksgiving.  There, we mostly just slept and played computer games all day in his room (between meals consisting usually of Turkey and/or a Baked Potato).

On the last day (Saturday), we ate ramen at Kome.  No contest, Shin-sen-gumi was better, but Kome probably has the best ramen in Austin (the bar isn't very high).  They put spinach and corn in my ramen.  You can see, I fished out the spinach and put it to the side, there.

And that leads up to today.  I re-arranged some furniture in a room.  This was something I had planned to do ever since we moved in (more than a year ago).  I'm very happy to have gotten that over with.  Then, I recounted the adventures of the last few weeks.  Next up, I have to clean my room.

A few things I noted on the various trips:

• Food in California is now cheaper than food in Dallas (things were not so 4 years ago).
  
• I was very glad to have met Joe's relatives and friends.  They're a pretty awesome bunch.  I was surprised by how comfortable I was to be around them (or just to be left alone by myself in the same room as them).
  
• In a recent dinner with another friend, he pointed out that in the long run, experiences matter more than money and the accumulation of wealth.  To some degree, these past few weeks have been an awesome time.  Many happy memories.