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UrbanSpoon is restaurant review site that I’ve been recently relying on to find new places to try while eating out. I like the fact that you can select different categories (i.e. Mexican, Italian, seafood) and sort the list by popularity/rating.

Since a lot of “foodies” use the site, I thought I could trust the rating system on UrbanSpoon but it turns out that we have to take the ratings listed on the site with a grain of salt. It seems that the problem that plagues other review sites like TripAdvisor and Citysearch, applies here as well. My guess is that savvy restaurant owners are skewing the ratings on UrbanSpoon in their favor. How else can one explain the reason for “Peking Garden” being listed as one of the top Chinese restaurants in Raleigh??

Until this past weekend, I had never been to Peking Garden since it looked to be one of those run of the mill old-school chinese restaurants from the 1980′s. But still it’s listed as one of the top picks in the area, so I thought I’d give it a try. bad idea.

I should have went with my instincts and stayed away from this place. It’s definitely old-school. From the bamboo decor to the koi fish pond, the place looks to be frozen in time, with no intention of updating their look or their food. And boy, is the food old fashioned and sad to say, just plain awful.

The General Tso’s was basic and passable. But the more expensive “gourmet” (not!) Hawaiian shrimp dish – was a joke. essentially prepackaged shrimp drowned in a “sweet & sour” sauce. oh and don’t get me started on the “Chicken in Garlic Sauce”. It’s more like GARLIC and more garlic with some chicken in it. I’m going to be smelling like garlic for days. oh and whatever you do, don’t ever order the double pan fried noodles with chicken. what a waste of money.

Two obvious tip offs that I unfortunately chose to ignore:
1) the place was far from crowded during dinner
2) we were the only asians dining there during our visit. So, if other asians won’t come to eat your asian food, what does that tell you??

This is no damn “hidden gem”, I can honestly tell you that right now. Obviously the owners (and friends/family etc) are tech savvy enough to know how to place these bogus votes/ratings on the various review sites like UrbanSpoon. Either that or these local yokels have absolutely no idea what good asian cuisine is supposed to taste like!
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It’s tough scheduling family outings when you have kids on different school calendars like we do. Two of our boys are in year-round schools and our oldest is under the standard traditional calendar. So whenever their vacation schedules eventually do overlap, we make an effort to do something worthwhile together.

This time around we went up to D.C. to visit with family. While there, we took advantage of the splendid weather and went museum hopping at the Smithsonian. Coincidentally it was time for the annual Cherry Blossom Festival so as you can imagine, it was pretty darn crowded in and around D.C. over the weekend.

random tidbits from the visit…

- can it be any MORE expensive to eat at Mickey D’s than at the Air and Space Museum? yikes. for a group of nine, it took a large bite out of the wallet!

- the kids loved riding the Metro even though it was slam packed. our six year old loved standing up while riding. in fact, he insisted on it even with a seat available.

- speaking of the Metro, from what I heard on the news, I think ridership on thurs/fri broke records. something like 900,000 trips were taken on both days. You may remember that the highest recorded riders was over 1 million trips on President Obama’s inauguration.

- with the huge crowds, we just did our best to see what we could at the Air/Space and Natural History museums. we barely scratched the surface since there’s SO MUCH to see there but enjoyed what all we saw nevertheless.

- barely got a glimpse of the hope diamond.. simply too many people congregated in that section of the exhibit. but the diamond/gem exhibit was probably the favorite part of the museum for the wife and her sister. heh.

- Roxy Paine’s Graft, a huge steel sculpture of a tree at the Sculpture garden was neat to see. it’s the first contemporary sculpture installed in the garden in the 10 years since it opened.

- definitely have to come back to see more of the Smithsonian. hopefully when it’s LESS crowded.

- before we left for home we made sure to visit our favorite korean noodle shop for some jja jang myun. for $4, you can’t beat the price PLUS it’s better than any I’ve tasted in the VA/NC area. definitely check out Choong Hwa Won if you’re any where near Annandale.

- another favorite eatery in the area is Spartan’s Family Restaurant (located in Burke, VA). Fantastic gyros, souvlakis and salads. it’s not much to look at but the food is always great.

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As a typical asian american growing up in the U.S., I had the notion that I could actually fit in with the rest of white america. I was what you’d call a “banana”. you know, white on the inside, yellow on the outside. also known as “twinkie”. I desperately wanted “acceptance” and even dated a “white girl” for three years as a teen.

But sadly, now that I’m older, I’ve come to the realization that I’ll always be labeled “asian-american” with an emphasis on ASIAN. It’s obvious that we as a nation aren’t color-blind and I can’t really see the day ever happening. I’m not sure if living in the “south” has tainted my view but from my experience, it feels like I’ll always have that “scarlet letter” scrawled on me. “A” for asian! I’m looked upon as “different” and will never be a part of white society. As the years pass me by, I feel even more disconnected and isolated from the community in general.

The way I see it, people simply categorize you as either “white”, “black” or “other”. No matter if I’m rich and successful, I’ll always be looked upon as an outsider. and I hate it. I hate the fact that people look at me and my family as “some foreigners”. I get the feeling the folks around here only have had limited contact with asians and quickly base their opinions about us via their dry cleaners and asian restaurant workers. I also have to blame high profile comedians like Bobby Lee and Ken Jeong for teaching middle america to laugh at short, weird looking korean people. thanks for perpetuating asian stereotypes, dudes!

I see this type of “racism” (subtle and not so subtle) every day – at work, at my kids’ schools, in my neighborhood (yes, I’ve got racist assholes for neighbors unfortunately), among parents at kids’ activities, and even out and about around town.

I sometimes wish I had those “blinders” on like I did as a teenager. Where I had some sort of faith in the world. some glimmer of hope. But with age, all I see now is the cruelty, bigotry and the prejudice in people.

I suppose this rant against white america makes me prejudiced as well. oh well. I don’t know. I’m just feeling down and had to vent.

give me some perspective here. anyone?

well, apparently Netflix is currently shipping out Wii Streaming Discs to a select number of lucky subscribers. Here’s the announcement on the Netflix blog:

I suppose they’re only sending out a limited number of discs at this time in order not to inundate their servers but still – I’m a bit bummed that I’m not part of the first batch of people. harumph. even my buddy Perpetual Girl is getting one this weekend! no fair!! keep me posted PG!

here are some random thoughts after watching last night’s season premiere of Dancing With the Stars.

- you know, I thought Samantha Harris was bad but her replacement Brooke Burke almost makes me want to take back all the bad things I said about Samantha over the years. well, almost. hopefully Burke will improve over the next few weeks.

- I think Nicole Scherzinger has an unfair advantage here being a performer and all. plus Derek Hough is known for his sleazy choreography so they’re the pair to watch this season.

- the judges reaction to Pamela Anderson‘s routine was simply hilarious. especially Bruno’s. can’t get more over the top than that. well with Bruno, ya never know, I guess. Pamela actually did better than I expected.

- I’m so glad to see Ashly DelGrosso Costa back on DWTS. She was one of my favorite professionals from the early seasons and it’s great to see her back so fit and trim. yum. she’s definitely candy for my eyes. (ugh, that sounds creepy. sorry.) it’s too bad she’s lumbered with Buzz Aldrin. Yes, he’s fit for an 80 year old but he’s got no charm or charisma let alone dancing ability. So, I don’t think I’ll get to see Ashly on the show for too much longer.

- and as for the mom of 8, Kate? I got nothing to say except: she needs to go. come on, people, make this a quick death. no need to torture the viewers any further. please vote for anyone except for this one!

- anyway the teams I’m currently rooting for: Scherzinger/Hough, team Pamela, Erin Andrews/Maksim, Chelsie Hightower and whoever she’s with, and of course, lovely Ashly and Buzz (but sadly there’s not much hope for Buzz…)

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my kids’ career goals…

the 12-year old: “I want to be a paleontologist so that I can go on far off excursions to discover rare fossils.”

the 8-year old: “I want to own my own company so that I can hire and fire people.”

and finally the 6-year old: “I want a lemonade stand.”

Like most cat owners, I’m on a mission to find some decent cat litter. Back when we initially adopted our little kitty, we started out with “Scoop Away” simply because it’s a popular brand and is widely available at most grocery stores. Well, we learned very quickly that it wasn’t a good choice for our household. Before I continue let me make it clear that I’m far from being an expert on this matter but I thought I’d share what I’ve learned so far…

Scoop Away Scented Cat Litter – This is a pretty well known brand of cat litter and heavily marketed on television and in magazines. We bought it thinking that it must be popular for a good reason. Well, the brand ended up not being a good fit in our household. First of all, Scoop Away is very dusty. Even though the package states that it’s 99.9% dust free, it ain’t so. Also the scented version smells like cheap perfume and the smell eventually overwhelms the senses. Yes, it does a good job in masking odor but that simply because you can’t smell much else BUT the cheap perfume smell. Since this is a clay-based litter, it clumps very well but I learned that clay isn’t good for a cat’s digestive system. Yes, I know a cat is not going to outright eat the stuff but the bits of litter gets on their fur & feet and you guessed it, the cat will inevitably digest it while cleaning themselves off. Oh and another downside was that the litter tracked quite a bit so we ended up with dust and bits of litter in our carpets and on our furniture. ugh. next up…

World’s Best Cat Litter (original formula) – Since learning of the health issues associated with clay-based products, we went with a corn-based litter called, what else, “The World’s Best Cat Litter”. Well unfortunately, it turns out, it’s NOT the world’s best cat litter after all. I mean, I like the fact that it’s natural and safe for cats and it clumps OK. But there are some negatives – there’s still a fine, yellow dust with this corn based litter. so you may end up with yellow paw prints after your cat’s visit to the litter box. And it does a poor job with deodorizing cat waste. the smell just lingers around a long while after the cat has done its business. We regularly scoop out (panning for gold) the box twice a day and it still smelled bad. blech.

World’s Best Cat Litter (multi-cat formula) – because of the odor issue, we tried out the multi-cat version of “World’s Best Cat Litter”. Again, it’s a natural, corn-based litter and it supposed to have an extra additive for fighting odors. And it did a better job with odors compared to the original formula but still a bit lacking.

So, just like the almighty Bono of U2, I still haven’t found what I’m looking for. At this point, I know that I’m sticking with an all-natural type litter. Or at least that’s my intention. I like the multi-cat version of the World’s Best Cat Litter but it needs to do a better job in absorbing odors.

So the hunt continues…
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let’s see what I’ve got packed for lunch today…

alright! the wife packed me kimbap today. normally, it’s the usual ho-hum turkey sandwich and chips but I’m pleasantly surprised to find kimbap in my lunch box today.

hhhhmmmm, what did I do to deserve this?

..uummm, nothing really comes to mind…

uh oh. I’m getting a bit suspicious now.

is the wife trying to soften me up for some big purchase in the near future???

hhhmmmmm…

The wife and I have been considering doing some updates to our kitchen. Our kitchen is pretty standard in terms of cabinets and appliances so there’s definitely room for improvement. We recently attended a home improvement expo and there were some undermount kitchen sinks that caught our eye. For those that aren’t familiar, undermount sinks are attached underneath the countertop which look a whole lot more modern and appealing than the usual “drop-in” sinks. And with granite or quartz countertops, undermounts are pretty much the way to go nowadays. And once the wife and I finally agree on the type of replacement countertops to go with, we’ll probably use MR Direct to order the sink. From our research, the online retailer offers fantastic prices on a variety of different styles and sizes. And most importantly, they’re accredited by the Better Business Bureau. But first things first – the wife and I are still going around in circles, trying to decide on the new color scheme of the cabinets and countertops.

This was a sponsored post written by me on behalf of MR Direct.

a child’s 8 AM game + temps in the 30′s = one grumpy soccer dad.

can you believe it? it’s already soccer season again. I thought I’d be able to sleep in on saturdays for at least a couple more weeks. come on!

harumph.