Whiling Away The Weekend

Over the last few months, I have come to cherish my weekly 48 hour cube farm furloughs. This is due, in part, to the fact that I recently discontinued my weekend knit/crochet teaching duties (nine hours of yarn store play every Saturday just became too much atop my weekly full-time cube farm commitment). It is also due, in part, to the fact that I now have my own space, chock full of my own things, a new locale filled with the delightful hustle and bustle of a mother/daughter duo going about their respective lives. Combine those ingredients with a heap-load of good friends, a busy urban setting providing lots of events to partake in at week's end, the new found psychic space in which to spread my wings and I've got a recipe for weekend scenarios that have become nothing short of a delightful respite from my work week stress-test-like schedule.

As such, last weekend's menu o' fun stuffs began with a lovely Friday eve dinner amongst friends at Hae Jang Chon in K-Town. (Got to love a restaurant that sports a grinning pig on the sign!) Our little foursome partook in the all you can eat meatfest where we sampled HJC's Bulgogi (BBQ beef), Black Angus beef brisket, marinated beef short ribs, thick slices of Canadian pork belly (mmm...bacon...), and BBQ pork.

Does anyone see a knit Canadian pork belly kilt on my design agenda? Methinks that might be a must...

*Ahem*

Anyway, all of the usual yummy Korean BBQ sides were also present: Kimchi; cone tortillas; rice cake; bean paste soup; and lettuce with sesame paste for constructing your own, uh, Korean tacos. The quality of the meat was stellar, sides were delish, price per person super reasonable in addition to something you don't see much of in my hometown...FREE PARKING. Oh, and my new buddy, Heather, and I drank many a bottle of pomegranate wine too.

Bellies full, our little party headed over to the Wiltern for a screening of one of my all time fave films, The Big Lebowski, for none other than Lewbowskifest. White Russians, I mean, uh, Caucasians all around! By the way, many a said beverage could be obtained throughout the screening from the bar...Nice!

Saturday, I had the opportunity to join a group of friends for an evening cooking class at Simple Gourmet in Redondo Beach. We spent the evening drinking wine and playing with knives. It was great! At the end of the evening our little group of novice chefs enjoyed the fruits of our labors...a three course French-inspired vegetarian meal. I would go into more detail and oh, show a few pictures, but I seem to have lost the camera I was using that evening. You see, my brain seems to be a bit muddled these days. Oh well, at least I still have my little point and shoot.

Easter Sunday involved, yes, you guessed it, more food. Brunch with family and friends at Luminarias followed by a lovely motorcycle ride traversing a handful of SoCal canyon roads. Nice way to spend the day to be sure...