/reader

At my job I have made a few of what you might call work friends through A. I like them but none of them really share any interests with me and I'm not sure any of them would be my friends if we didn't work together. In this regard I think I'm harder to befriend than E and many of my other friends who hang out with friends from work outside of the office. I'm not an easygoing person to begin with, and my hobbies are generally more niche and solitary. (Most of my free time is dedicated to reading and writing.)

J and I went to Hay Hay Roasted (decent) and Mei Lai Wah (not good, even if we didn't have to wait in line) while we waited for the rest.

Honey roast pork, roast duck

Once E and his crew arrived we got late lunch at Kong Sihk Tong. I have been here quite a few times now and chaos aside I usually enjoy coming here. I just need to be careful what I order.

Peanut sauce rice noodles, beef chow fun, Japanese curry, sweet and sour pork ribs. Not pictured: golden lava toast, gai lan (Chinese broccoli) in oyster sauce.

Afterwards E, B, and V got their own roast duck over rice at Great NY Noodletown, then dumplings at both Fried Dumpling and Jin Mei Dumpling, none of which I found remarkable, before we ended up at The Little One for some light dessert. The ghost of Misu past is still there, laughing at the table by the window. I hope he is always happy.

Large hojicha kakigōri

All in all it was a good day, even though we consumed a heinous amount of food. I do wish eating to excess weren't so common in my life...

After clocking out on Friday I met up with M and A at Angel. Thankfully there was no wait at 5 PM and we devoured vegetable pakora (good, not pictured), butter chicken (okay, not pictured), goat dum biryani (good), and garlic naan (great).

As we dug into our goat biryani we saw a man wheel in a shopping cart full of raw goats. Their skins shone pale and their legs pointed skywards. Unpleasant as it may be at times, I appreciate opportunities to see where my food comes from (in healthy doses). This is coming from someone who very rarely cooks meat at home (primarily for dietary reasons but also) because he doesn't like seeing or handling raw meat.

I'm glad to scratch Angel off my list. The food there is decent but the prices are a little high for me to come back regularly. Next time I'm told we must get the lotus root kofta and the lamb chops.

Earlier that morning M waited three hours in line to get rush tickets to see SUNSET BLVD. at St. James Theatre. After dinner we headed over to catch the show. I don't want to say much for fear of spoiling the show but I will say Nicole Scherzinger is great and the show makes use of some innovative techniques. I enjoyed it despite going in blind and I would recommend it for anyone remotely interested.

the pit orchestra in the St. James is under the stage! how neat...

M is my Broadway friend. This is my second show I've seen with her (the first one being Hamilton two years ago), which should say a lot about her influence on me considering I've only ever seen some five? six? Broadway shows in my life. I am glad that her passion is contagious, for without her nudging I rarely go see shows at all. I'm not sure if I'm put off by the price (much higher than that of a typical classical concert) or the crowds or the Times Square chaos but almost all of my Broadway experiences have been good. Perhaps I just don't find plays or musicals as soul-affirming as I do classical music and this just manifests itself as a general hesitation.

Generally I struggle to follow along with Broadway plays and musicals more than I do classical concerts, which makes sense — there's a lot more going on in a show than a concert and I have spent much more time listening to classical music. Plus, I rarely get to or want to listen to the soundtrack or read the plot before seeing the show, so come showtime I usually struggle mightily to see and hear and understand what's going on. Sunset Boulevard was no different. Thankfully I caught enough of it (maybe 75%?) to make the experience worthwhile.

*   *   *

I am drained from lack of sleep and vaccine rebound, so today's food crawl through Flushing with M and E will just have to be a bulleted list.

• Eight Jane
• Joe's Steam Rice Roll

• Molly Tea - Flushing Queens

  • "Life changing," M said after waiting half an hour for her jasmine milk tea.
  • J says 状元茶事 Tea Scholar and TEAPULSE are about the same quality as Molly. I don't think any food or drink is worth waiting half an hour for.

• Xie Bao Flushing 蟹寶

• Soy Bean Chan Flower & Gift Shop

• Fat Cat Flatbread

• Fujian Noodle

  • The location for the Google listing (sparse to begin with) seems inaccurate. It is closer to here, I think.

After dinner E and his coworker V came over to our apartment to rest for a bit before going bar hopping with J and (other E), et al. in East Village. E in particular was trying to figure out what I was going to do with the rest of the night and the first half of tomorrow without any plans. Maintaining my daily functioning and the cleanliness of the apartment can fill up any amount of time; with what's left there is always an endless supply of things to read and write.