2 Great Shows, and a trip to the Bay Area

 

I had a very eventful and fun week that I'd like to share with y'all.  Last Thursday, Mixy and I checked out the Vancouver indie-rock supergroup, the New Pornographers at the Henry Fonda.  The New Pornographers are mainly anchored by A.C. Newman from the band Zumpano that I used to be a huge fan of in the late 90's.  I thought they had disappeared, but the New Pornographers featuring other indie-rocksters such as Neko Case and Dan Bejar, are quite the hot band these days.  I was super-tired for the show cause I worked at 6am that day, and couldn't fall asleep for a priorly planned pre-concert nap.  The show was riveting nonetheless.  When all the different instruments and interweaving vocals, came together at the right time, the results were just magic.  Standouts were the Neko Case songs "Letter from an Occupant", and "The Laws Have Changed" (Neko Case is a pretty well known alternative-country singer songwriter).  If you don't have their albums, at least consider downloading those two songs off of Itunes.

 

The next day was quite brutal for me.  I went to bed after the concert at about 1:30, and had to wake up at 4am to pack for an SF trip and to work at the ER at 6am.  Let's just say I have not been that tired for a long time.  After work I headed down to the refreshingly quaint Long Beach Airport.  I had a great time watching the sunset from the terrace, while talking with Juddy and Dober.  The trip was to go to the Bay Area for my cousin Levi's wedding.  Mixy's family drove up with her earlier that day, because they were going up to visit Greedymonger.

 

I flew jet blue for the first time.  Thanksfully the landing gear deployed properly.  I thought the crew was very funny (even funnier than Southwest).  The direct TV really helped pass the time.  I mainly watched Iron Chef.  By the time Pat picked me up from the airport, I think I was totally delirious from sleep deprivation. 

 

The next day, Mixy, Jober, my parents, and I went to my cousin Levi's wedding in Sunnyvale.  The ceremony was short but sweet.  I was really happy for them.  I think they are perfect for each other (They also share many uncanny similiarities such as using the same toothpaste, and ordering the same dishes at fastfood restaurants).  On the right is a picture of my cousin Mae, and her husband Selim doing the reading. 

 

Before the reception, Jober, Mixy, cousin Walt, and I chilled out with cousin Hans and his wife Lani.  The reception itself was at a pretty good Chinese restaurant. 

 

My favorite little touches of the reception were the life-like figurines on the wedding cake, and the sparkler send off at the end (I've never held a sparkler before that night!!!)

 

Next day, Greedy took us to the local Chinese eatery for a dim-sum feast.  The whole Mixygirl extended clan was in attendance.  Above on the left is a picture of the aftermath.  After that we headed to Caroline and Skorn's apartment by UCSF because they just had a baby a few weeks ago named Alyssa (Milano?!?!?).  Alyssa was very cute, and really really small.  We're guessing it's cause Caroline was really small when she was born.

 

 

After SF, Greedy, Pat, Toro, Mixy, and I headed to a dog park.  We had a great time,  The pictures from top left clockwise show 1) entry 2) Kapono and Akki playing 3)Kapono drinking from a fountain for the first time 4) a actual Siberian Husky that some other dog owner brought to the park.  I did also get to see two dogs maul each other, but I was too slow to take a picture.  One of the owners got his hand bitten open also.  It was very cool!!!

 

 

Greedy and Pat showed us a local japanese eatery for dinner that night.  The highlights included the blue crab salad with uni-sauce on the left, and on the right are pieces of divine ama-ebi with yuzu tobiko on top (also one lonely piece of toro, about to be gobbled up).

Monday was just amazing.  Greedy, Pat, Mixy, Mixy's parents, Toro, and I headed to Napa valley for a day of wine tasting and Napa cuisine.  Our first stop was Carneros Creek which I didn't get any decent pictures of, but our second stop was really special, and maybe the best time I've ever had at a winery.  The picture above is the view from the hilltop of this winery named Artesa!!!

 

 

Artesa had a really dramatic location on top of a rolling hillside with the winery built into the side of the hill (like a hobbit's dwelling).  Their wines were fantastic, and we found their unsually oaked Sauvignon Blanc to be really good.  They had a wide variety of different wines, and we all decided to join their wine club right on the spot.  This was definitely the most picturesque winery I've been to.

 

Greedy and Pat brought us to Bistro Jeanty for a Napa Valley lunch after Artesa.  I have to say that this was the best Bistro food I've ever had (in France, or America).  All the ingredients were fresh and the dishes cooked to perfection without being overly fussy.

 

I started with Langue d'Agneau which was a lamb tongue and potato salad.  Sounds sick, but the lamb tongue was so soft, and just gamey enough to be completely delicious!!!  Super DHS status for sure.  Mixy started with the dish on the right Petit Sale aux Lentilles (home cured pork belly with a lentil and foie gras ragout).

 

Pat started on the left with Crouton de Foi Blond (Duck foie gras pate, and port poached pear)  The pate was divine although Pat originally thought she was ordering a seared foie gras type of dish,  Toro started with Terrine de Lapin (Rabbit Pate with celery root apple salad), I loved the celery root apple salad. . 

 

Ben started on the left with Truite Fume (house smoked trout salad on potato slices),  His dish was really good.  I'm glad it wasn't like a cooked smoked but more of a lox/sashimi type of smoked trout, really yummy DHS.  Ping (Mixy's Dad) started with escargots (not the Mr. Ferley pronunciation).

 

I started with an amazing Cassoulet (Baked beans, duck confit, sausage, and bacon).  Okay this was an amazing dish.  It puts French Cassoulets to shame.  The duck was just amazingly tender and thorougly flavored by the baking and the bacon.  Just a beautifully executed dish.  As was Mixy's pasta with mushroom and red wine reduction sauce.  A great hearty bistro pasta dish if there ever was one. 

 

On the left was Mixy's Dad's Sole Meuniere (sole, mashed potatoes, lemon-caper sauce).  On the right was Pat's coq au Vin (chicken, mushrooms, bacon red wine stew).

 

On the left is Greedy's Quiche aux Poireaux (ham and leek quiche with butter lettuce).  On the right is a truly magnificent dish that Toro and her Mom both ordered.  It is described as Daube de Boeuf (beef stew, mashed potatoes, peas and carrots).  I have to admit that when I read the menu description, I was thinking  "Why would anyone waste their time having beef stew for lunch at a french bistro."  Boy was I wrong.  This beef must've been stewing for years, because it was sooo tender and tasty.  It's a really good sign when a restaurant can make beef stew taste better than filet mignon. Super DHS.

 

We thought we were too full, but Toro ordered dessert, and I loved them!!!  On the left is rice pudding with brandied cherries, and on the right is a lemon meringue tart.  One of the busboys stepped on Kober's paw accidentally during the meal.  He recovered well though.

 

Our next stop was Opus One Winery.  The location of this winery is just stunning.  Opus One is a very high-end winery that makes French red blends.  It is a joint venture of Robert Mondavi and Baron Phillippe de Rothschild.

The tasting was pretty crazy in that it was 25-30$ per glass of wine.  I enjoyed their 2001 vintage, but I'm probably not enough of a wine afficionado to be able to appreciate this wine.

 

Next winery up was Peju Province.  The tasting was pretty funny because there was this other group of people that were really drunk and being loud and obnoxious the whole time!!! I did buy a few bottles of their Provence rose' which I was a big fan of from the first time we visited Napa.

 

Our last stop was this wacky winery in Stag's Leap District owned by a dutchman named Michael Van Der Heyden.  He sells his wine out of a shack basically.  He kind of sells them as if he is working at a carnival and selling those old cure-all miracle tonics.  His specialty is late harvest Cabernet Sauvignon (only person to ever do it in the world).  Late harvest wine is wine made from grapes that are left on the vine longer to accumulate more sugar to turn them into dessert wines.  A big thanks to Greedy and Pat for helping to arrange a very fun day.

 

So, there was quite a controversy b/w Toro and her Dad over where we were going to have dinner.  In the end, I guess the spoiled daughter (j/k) will usually win (which she did).  Therefore we ended up trying House of Prime Rib which Toro had been dying to try for like 9 years.  It's supposed to be the San Francisco equivalent, and possibly even superior counterpart of Lawry's in Los Angeles.

 

The spinning salad, I don't think was as good as Lawry's, and Francisco our prime rib cutter yelled at our waitress for not being present when he was ready to start serving the food.  Overall the atmosphere and service was very chaotic unlike Lawry's.

 

The prime rib itself was very good.  I was about to get upset about lack of creamed horseradish, until they dolloped this very fluffly creamed horseradish, and even a tabasco flavored one (red).  Overall I would still go with Lawry's if I had the choice.  Lawry's had slightly better food, and definitely better service/atmosphere.  But I'm not complaining, kick ass prime rib is welcome any day of the week in my book. 

The next morning was somewhat sad, as Akki (Greedy and Pat's Klee Kai) and Kapono had to say goodbye to each other.  They always have fun playing with each other.  After that Mixy, Toro, Mixy's parents, and I drove back to LA.

 

Our first stop on the way back was Casa De Fruta.  It was Pumpkin day, and Kapono had lots of fun there.

 

On the way back where the 152 meets the 5 South, there is a Danish restaurant called Andersen'sthat is apparently a California institution, famous for its split pea soup. 

 

So, the soup comes by itself, but you can pay a little bit extra for the condiment tray, which in retrospect is a must.

 

The soup was just amazing.  Who knew split pea soup could taste so good!!!

 

Mixy and I had Danish meatballs and sausages for entrees.  They were a little too heavy considering how much we had ate over the weekend, but tasted hearty and were satisfying nonetheless.

 

This past Friday, Mixy and I saw Scottish indie-dance-rock band Franz Ferdinand play a fun show at the Greek Theatre.  I loved their first album, and the one that they just released earlier in the week was amazing as well.  The show was really fun with everyone on their feet and dancing for the whole set.  I can't say that it blew me away emotionally, like some really good shows can, but I can say that it was very cool that a whole theatre full of usually stoic indie rockers were on their feet and dancing for the duration.

Saturday at Malibu

 

Had a great time this past Saturday with Mixygirl.  We headed up to Malibu for a hike.  On the drive there the waves were pretty big, so lots of surfers were out.  We stopped in Malibu Colony village to eat sandwiches at a little sandwich shop I discovered with Moglandor.  There's a cool garden and playground where we watched all the rich Malibu kids play at.

 

I had a very tasty chicken and cashew sandwich.  On the right is Mixygirl's egg salad and avocado sandwich which I thought was too big to be practically eaten.

 

After lunch we headed north for about ten minutes to this cool little hike at Solstice Canyon.  I recently bought a book detailing SoCal's best hikes.  Hopefully Mixy and I will be able to do lots of them since she isn't working anymore.  It was really peaceful and a nice experience.  Kober had a lot of fun also.

 

In case you haven't seen a picture of Kober for a while, here's an update.  On the right you can see that he is quite hesitant in crossing streams. 

 

There was a lot of beautiful scenery along the way, and the hike ends at the ruins of an old terrace of a former Malibu mansion.

 

On the way back, we saw evidence as to why Malibu homes are so prone to mudslides.  Finally, we glimpsed a cool shot of someone parachuting in the canyon!!!

So this week in LA has been pretty fun.  I've been pretty psyched because lots of good shows are coming up including Franz Ferdinand, the New Pornographers, the Black Crowes, and Henry Rollins spoken word.  I am particularly psyched cause I scored a single ticket for the Rolling Stones at the forum for March 2006.  I usually can't get myself motivated enough to buy tickets right when they go on sale for these mega-concerts, but I recently decided that I had to see the Stones before one of them died.  I still remember listening to that Hot Rocks cassette over and over again while I was making model airplanes in junior high and watching She-ra at the same time.  So I woke up at 9:45 to get the tickets on the internet that went on sale at 10am.  Unfortunately I needed to go to the bathroom later, and when I came back to the computer it was 10:01!!!  When I got through, I couldn't get two tickets together.  All I could get was one ticket!!  The ticket was the most expensive I've ever paid to see a show, and it wasn't even a floor seat.  It was so expensive, that even I was questioning if I should get it or not (to see the price, you can go to ticketmaster website yourself, it's too outrageous to actually spell it out here).  Well I knew I had to bite the bullet and get the ticket because... it's the Stones!!!

Basquiat

So, my dream when Mixy quit her job was that we would spend our weekdays going to cool lunches, and going to museums and hikes and etc. etc.  Well I'm pleased to report that things are going well.  Monday we headed out for a great lunch at Langer's and then went to MOCA for a Basquiat retrospective.  For those of you who aren't familiar with Basquiat, he was a pretty infamous artist from the 80's.  He started out as a homeless runaway in NYC, then became a graffitti artist under the tagname SAMO.  After that he expanded out to serious art, but with a graffitti style bent to it.  He became really famous and hung with Andy Warhol and even dated Madonna for a time. There's a pretty cool movie about his life, where David Bowie plays the Andy Warhol character.  The dude basically was a total druggy, and eventually OD'd at the age of 27 in 1988.  However I have to say his work does kick ass.  It takes elements of graffitti art, african art, and references black legends like jazz player and famous boxers.  He didn't have any formal training but his compositional strength reminds me of Picasso, and his use of color reminds me of Matisse (His art of the insane qualities, remind me of Dubuffet).  Check out the exhibit, it lasts til Oct 10th!!!  Here's some of the works that I really liked from the exhibit.

Grillo

Notary

Six Crimee

 

In Italian, Horn Players

 

Pegasus (Mixygirl's favorite and owned by John McEnroe), Sugar Ray Robinson

Gold Griot

Mixygirl and I checked out a movie Thursday at The Grove after having awesome mexican food at Loteria in Farmer's Market.  So I have to admit I was definitely a newcomer to enjoying Tim Burton's A Nightmare Before Christmas, but I got the DVD and have seen it many times this year and just think it's genius.  Therefore I was really looking forward to his new stop-motion animated flick Corpse Bride.  Alas, corpse bride doesn't have nearly as much imagination and fun as Nightmare.  It's kind of a slightly interesting story, with characters that aren't fleshed out that well.  The movie is also really really short.  The visuals were still interesting, but the songs weren't as good.  Overall still an enjoyable experience but definitely a disappointment from what I was expecting.  I was hoping he was going to take this medium to the next level, but instead he took it two steps backward.

Viva Las Vegas, Day 4

Well I am happy to say that I have returned from my East Coast trip, and had a great time.  Unfortunately tragedy struck in NYC, and I lost our digital camera in a taxi-cab.  Even worse, it had all our NYC pictures in it and Mixygirl's pictures from her Russia/Eastern Europe vacation!!!  Needless to say, I was in the doghouse.  I thought I'd finish the Las Vegas post before starting on the East Coast trip blog.

 

Our last day in Vegas was spent at the Commander's Palace for lunch.  It seems that no matter how many other new Vegas restaurants we try, that we always come back and have the best time at Commander's Palace.  The original branch is in New Orleans (I hope it survived the Hurricane), and is famous for being the top Creole restaurant in the country.  The Vegas branch is in the Aladdin.  This Sunday we were pleased to see a three piece jazz band livening up the festivities.

 

I started out with the jumbo lump crab cake, griddle seared and topped with a truffled crabmeat salad and marinated crab claws (Super DHS).  Mixygirl had an excellent gumbo.

 

Toro started out with the excellent soup trio.  My favorite is always the turtle soup with the sherry poured on top!!!  Mixygirl's main dish was Steak and Eggs "Pontalba" consisting of pepper crusted beef tenderloin medallions served with poached eggs and Pontalba potatoes (sauteed with housemade tasso ham, mushrooms ,and finished with a creole spiced hollandaise sauce).

 

Toro had an eggs benedict-like dish surrounded with barbecue P&J oysters.  I had the good old Louisiana Pecan crusted catfish, creole seasoned and topped with a petit green salad and spiced pecans, finished with crushed corn cream and creole meuniere sauce.

 

Toro finished off with some sort of chocolate based dessert which was pretty good.  Mixygirl as is her tradition, ended off with the creole bread pudding souffle served with bourbon whiskey sauce (DHS).

 

My dessert was absolutely fantastic, french quarter beignets dusted with powdered sugar and served with a warm cafe au lait sauce and chocolate drizzles.  The texture of these lovely beignets were just amazing and cafe au lait sauce was excellent, just a perfect dessert (Super DHS).  On the right is Toro, and Mixy with me in the middle at the start of our great meal.  Hope you enjoyed the Vegas stuff,  East Coast stuff to come next.  The NYC part will not have any photos b/c of the lost camera, but the Providence, Maine, Boston stuff should have pictures, cause we borrowed Mark Lu's camera for the latter part of the trip. 

I'm sure I echo the sentiments of Jober and Juddy when I say,  Rest in Peace little buddy.

Shonen Knife @Galaxy Theatre

Had a rocking time at Shonen Knife last night all the way down in Santa Ana.  They played the Santa Monica pier yesterday, and Troubadour tomorrow, but I was working both of those days.  Apparently Shonen Knife played 3 days in the LA area just because they were offered good money to come and do the Santa Monica pier thing.  The show was really fun.  The audience was mediocre, but I had a great time rocking out to all those great songs of their's over the years.  Here's a partial set list: Riding the Rocket, Bear up Bison, Twist Barbie, I am a Cat, Concrete Animals, Antonio Baka Guy, Public Bath, Top of the World, Cobra V.S. Mongoose, Explosion, Tower of the Sun, Wonder Wine, Konnichiwa, Cookie Day, Spam, Hot Chocolate, Sushi Bar song, and Brown mushrooms.  After the show a lot of people stayed late to get autographs and pictures.  These two kids couldn't afford any t-shirts.  I took pity on them and covered them, and in exchange they had a digital camera on them so they let me take a picture with them and Shonen Knife!!!  They e-mailed it to me this morning.  I talked a little with Naoko and Atsuko.  I got to use my limited Japanese from the Japan trip.  I told them how we went to Osaka and enjoyed the Okonomiyaki at the Fugetsu Restaurant (which they were instantly familiar with).  I had a great time.  Tomorrow I'm leaving for NYC!!!

Viva Las Vegas Day3

Mixygirl and I started the day out with a great breakfast at Tableau, a restaurant open for breakfast and lunch exclusively to suite guests.

 

The meal began with an assortment of pastries (my favorite was the banana turnover)

 

Mixygirl had blueberry ricotta pancakes with maple pecan butter (DHS),  I had a take on eggs benedict consisting of poached egg on top of kobe beef short ribs, and a potato pancake (Super DHS).  The meat was exquisitely tender and richly sauced, just an amazing way to start out the day.  After that we chilled out at the pool, waiting for Toro to fly in from LA.

 

When Toro arrived, we headed to Caesars to calm her hunger pangs.  We stopped off first at the Seahorse bar which is my favorite bar in Vegas and I've never had a drink there.  They have a cool tank with tons of seahorses.  This time not as many as last time.  Some of the seahorses were apparently pregnant also.  One, that Mixygirl was trying to point our attention to, looked like it had a hard boiled egg in its stomach.  Unfortunately I had better pictures last time, but they got wiped off with the hard drive crash. 

 

To Toro's relief, we left the seahorse bar and sat down at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill for lunch.  The bread basket was awesome, and the Southwest style bacon and hash brown quesadilla was excellent.

 

I had the blue corn encrusted halibut.  Mixygirl had the always excellent spicy chicken and sweet potato hash (DHS).

 

Toro had the New Mexico spiced pork tenderloin sandwich.  Despite her professed hunger, she couldn't finish it, and even tried to hide the photographic evidence!!!  Admittedly this is not the best Mesa Grill dish, and we should've remembered that when Jober ordered it in March, it wasn' t that good. 

 

After lunch, we headed to the opulent Forum Shops to do what else, Shop!!!  My purchase highlight was a red-neck style Corona shirt.

To my shock, while I was outside the Nike store I saw a huge crowd gather towards the Cheesecake Factory.  None other than Shaq, was having lunch there!!!    Another highlight of the forum shops was having an early dinner at Joe's stone crab claws, bloody marys, and sharing a slice of keye lime pie.

 

After Caesar's we walked through Bellagio.  I have to say that I saw the worst ever Bellagio atrium display.  It was a USA theme.  They had these horrible animatronic baby eagles.  To add insult to injury when we went outside, there was no fountain show because some guys were repairing it.  Toro swore she had to go back later because apparently she is obsessed with the Bellagio fountains.  We did manage to see an art exhibit from the MFA in Boston at the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art.  It was mostly so-so impressionist landscapes.  Fortunately they had a few excellent Renoirs and Monets. 

I was also psyched that they had my favorite painting from the MFA there, Van Gogh's "Houses at Auvers".

 

So after Bellagio, we headed to the Hard Rock to see the Odd Men Out tour at the Joint, their live music venue.  The venue was pretty cool.  Great sound, perfect size, and easy to see the performers.  Ben Lee opened up.  I have heard of him for many years but for some reason never got into his music.  His set was pretty fun.  It sounds mainly like mellow folk-pop.  He finished with a great song on his new album called "We're all in this together". 

 

Next up was Ben Folds.  He was clearly the crowd favorite of the night, and turned in a great set of songs from his solo stuff, and old favorites from the Ben Folds Five days.  I particularly liked "Bitches Ain't Shit", his gangsta rap song.  Rufus Wainwright (whom we adore) closed out the night with a fantastic set.  Not as strong as the one we saw last March at UCLA, but still excellent.  Highlight for me was definitely his cover of Leonard Cohen's (Jeff Buckley also does a pretty famous version) song, Hallelujah.  After the show MG and I were pretty tired so we all headed back to the Wynn to crash.  We did get some Chinese food from a restaurant in the Wynn to eat as a late night snack.  I guess cause we didn't go clubbing or bar-hopping afterwards, Toro dubbed her visit the Not-So-Wild Vegas trip. 

What's up CP readers?  I've been working a lot since the Vegas trip, and while Mixygirl is in Russia/Eastern Europe with Greedymonger/Pat.  Was a pretty surreal day yesterday.  I got a call from one of the Olive View ER directors yesterday, telling me that when I was to work later that afternoon, John Leguizamo would be showing up to shadow me!!!!  Turns out that Leguizamo will be in 12 episodes of ER the show this year, and he will be playing an attending physician.  Just by coincidence the day that he turned up to shadow a real life attending physician at Olive View, was the day that I was on duty.  Pretty cool, cause I think out of all of the attendings I probably know the most about him.  He showed up with Joe Sachs who is the ER doctor who is the technical supervisor for ER the show, and a graduate of the UCLA-Olive View residency himself.  John Leguizamo was really nice and down to earth in real life.  He's pretty short and looks a lot older in real life (he's about 40 yrs old).  He followed me, and some ER residents around for about 2 hours.  I think he was impressed by how many patients we have to keep track of at a time.  I got to tell him that I enjoyed his Sexaholix one man show, and his role as Toulouse Lautrec in Moulin Rouge.  In honor of him being there, I played the Moulin Rouge soundtrack on my ipod in the doctor's room.  Pretty weird, but fun experience.  I'm getting ready these next few days for our NYC/Boston/Maine trip for Navin's wedding, but I hope to finish the Vegas posts before then.

So, slight break from the Viva Las Vegas series.  I had an awesome time last night at the Snoop Dogg Youth Football League benefit concert at the Greek Theatre.  I went with Bagal, and Lori (nurse from Olive View). The show is benefitting a pee-wee league that Snoop has started here in Socal.  Problem is that it's so popular that it's stealing players and coaches from the regular old leagues, so Bagal wasn't so sure if he wanted to support the cause.  Whatever though, Chilipeppers!!!  So, when we got there, the amount of security was just insane (We were merely there a week ago for the White Stripes).  This time there were cops on horseback everywhere, and metal detectors at the doors.  The cops even had profiles of criminals at the door, that they presumably would not let in.  I guess it's all cause Ice Cube and Snoop Dogg were performing.  The first on the bill was Ice Cube.  He was pretty fun, and the highlight were "Check yo self", and "It was a good day".  After Cube, Wanda Sykes came out and did some lame jokes.  After Wanda, Snoop came out and introduced the Red Hot Chilipeppers, and the place went nuts.  Early on they had some sound problems (You couldn't hear the bass or drums well, and the whole mix was too low), but they seemed to work themselves out by the middle of the show.  The peppers have reached a level of musicianship, energy, and mental harmony that I have just never seen before in any group.  The energy level was just incredible.  John Frusciante just lets his whole body go during the performance.  His intro instrumentals where him and flea just improvise with each other, are just amazing and beautiful.  The partial set list was "Can't stop", "Scar Tissue", "Parallel Universe", "Throw Away Your Television", "Otherside", "Californication", "Right on Time", and "Give it away".  Extra songs included John Frusciante singing "I feel love", by Donna Summers with only Flea on bass,  They played a new songs that was really funky yet melodic at the same time.  I think they ended on "School's Out" by Alice Cooper, in tribute to the time they got beat up by bouncers for trying to sneak into the Greek for an Alice Cooper show during their youth.  The energy just kept on going for Snoop Dogg, which was really cool to see, cause the whole crowd was into all the acts on the bill.  Snoop gave probably the best hip hop performance I've ever seen.  He had a whole horn section and backing band, but kept the act true to hip-hop and not corporate appearing whatsoever.  The sound was just amazing and full, which is really rare for hip-hop shows to have.  Highlights included "Gin and Juice", "Next Episode", and "Drop it like it's Hot".  Snoop also had his nephew Tommy the clown "dude in a clown suit" come out and referee a dance competetition between two little kids that were doing some seriously intense hip hop dancing.  I think the show went awesome, hearing the combination of acts initially I was worried that it might not gel together that well, but the show more than exceeded my expectations.  Here's to Snoop and the Peppers. 

Viva Las Vegas, Day 2

Day 2 of Vegas started off with a cool trip to the Wynn Collection.  It features artwork from Steve Wynn's personal art collection, as the name implies.  The audio guide is Steve Wynn talking also.  He's pretty knowledgeable, and self deprecating as well.  All the pieces were really good examples from each artist.  (Before going to the gallery, I lost 12 hands of black jack in a row, which cost me dearly).

 

Here's a couple of my favorite pieces that day.  On the left is Bathers by Gaugin, and on the right is La Reve (The Dream), by Picasso.  They named the show at the Wynn (Cirque du Soleil-esque), after this painting.  At the end was a really funny Andy Warhol tryptich of Steve Wynn himself!!!  After lunch, we just walked right next door from the Wynn Collection to an excellent Italian restaurant that specializes in seafood, called Bartolotta Ristorante Del Mare

 

The decor was real nice, and the outside overlooks a pool of water with silver balls floating in it.  It got a pretty good review by S. Irene Verbila in LA Times. 

 

 

Bartolotta specializes in fresh seafood flown in from Italy.  I had the Branzino which is a sea bass found off of italy.  They prepare these difficult to find fishes grilled or broiled simply with olive oil and lemon.  The fish is deboned at the table as you can see in the pictures above.  the meat is placed on a plate and then topped with a sauce of tomatoes and basil.  It tasted amazing, and was so simple at  the same time. 

 

Mixygirl had an amazing dish called taglioni agli scampi con pomini all' origano (translatation=handcrafted thin ribbon pasta with langoustines, pormini tomatoes, and oregano).  The pasta was perfectly prepared and the dish was just amazingly executed (DHS).  On the side we both had a roasted veggie and fingerling potato dish. 

 

We just relaxed during the afternoon.  First we laid out by the pool.  There's a separate pool for the suite guests.  On the right is my view of the hotel while laying down.  After the pool, we both went the spa and got massages.  Mine wasn't as good as it could've been, but I did enjoy the steam room a lot. 

 

For dinner, Mixy and I went to Daniel Boulud brasserie.  We followed S. Irene's recommendation and started with the house-made charcuterie plate.  It was decent but nothing spectacular. 

 

For our main course, we split the "Original DB Burger".  It consisted of a 9 oz sirloin burger, stuffed with braised short ribs, foie gras, and black truffle.  It sounded really good, however in reality it was too tall to eat like a burger, and you couldn't really appreciate all the different fillings.  It just tasted somewhat blaah.  Too bad, cause it looks really good, doesn't it.  Unfortunately our Boulud meal experience wasn't that good, but I haven't given up on it yet, because some of their other entrees sounded really good, and perhaps we didn't order the best things on the menu (There's always next time). 

 

After dinner we caught a cab (the craziest cab driver I have ever had) to the Rio to see the Penn and Teller show.  I've seen it before, but Mixygirl hadn't however they added new stuff since I saw it a couple years back.  They hung out afterwards outside the theatre to sign autographs which I thought was pretty cool.  We were able to see Teller actually talking, albeit in a low voice, to people.  We didn't take any pictures with them or get any autographs, but I did get to talk to Penn Jillette briefly.  I asked him if he could tell us his version of the Aristocrats joke (He just put out a movie about differen't comedian's versions of the dirtiest joke ever told only behind comedic doors, called the Aristocrats).  He said he couldn't do it right then (little kids were standing around), but he asked me if I saw the movie, and I told him I did and that I had enjoyed it a lot.  So that was pretty cool, and a great way to cap off Day 2 of Viva Las Vegas.