3 posts tagged “food”
Boy 2008 is going by quickly - it's already getting to the middle of February. Today of course is Chinese New Year, and one of my Chinese colleagues brought a treat to the office for the occasion - Water Chestnut Cake. It was amazing. I need to get the recipe from her, but here is one I found online. All this time I've been putting water chestnut into curries and stir fries when I could have been putting it into cakes :)
I have to admit I am a sucker for Asian desserts - almond jelly, custard balls, egg tarts, chiffon cake... - just to name a few. Oh and there is a great Chinese bakery, Regent, down the road from Microsoft which does a mean mango mousse cake and fruit tarts. What I love about Asian desserts versus Western-style ones is that they are not as sweet and not as heavy. Ok I shouldn't be thinking about dessert this early in the day.
In other news, I moved into my new place in Capitol Hill a couple of weeks ago. It's closer to my friends, much quieter and greener than living smack bang in the middle of downtown, and I have my own place again. It's been great so far. I can see the sun rise over the mountains in the mornings (admittedly it's rare that the sun actually gets a look-in in winter, but summer's going to be fab). And the kitchen is huge and wonderful and I've been cooking up a storm. Ach there I go, inevitably back to the topic of food again. Let me end this before I start eating my keyboard.
This was a week of music. Al, Astha, Sam, Alice and I were at KeyArena on Tuesday to see Snow Patrol. As if that weren't an exciting enough prospect on its own, the opening acts were Silversun Pickups and Ok Go. I bought my tickets almost 2 months in advance, that's how pumped I was for this concert.
SSPU were on first, and although they acquitted themselves pretty well and played all the songs I was hoping to hear, I just didn't feel like they were ready to play in such a big venue yet. Even though their music is, going on pure decibels, more than loud enough to fill up KeyArena, it just didn't feel like they did. The frontman was chatty and energetic, but he didn't interact with the other band members at all, and that really detracted from the show. I'm sure as they get more experience playing to a big crowd it'll improve, but it seemed to me they were a little overawed. That aside, they played well. I was totally rocking out to Well Thought Out Twinkles and Lazy Eye. I'll definitely go see them next time they're here if they play at a more intimate venue.
It's quite possible that I judged SSPU more harshly on the basis of the band immediately followed. Ok Go were an absolute whirlwind of colour, light and energy on stage. They were simply awesome. Everything was quirky and fun, from the lead singer's banter to the wacky videos playing in the background to the crazy guitar-toting dancing of everyone on stage. Talk about a fun 45 minutes. I didn't want them to go off stage.
Snow Patrol took long enough to come onstage that Astha got pissed off and threatened to leave several times. She was just about to start looking for the exit when the lights went down, and from then on she forgot all her annoyance, because they were truly awesome. Gary, the frontman, charmed the entire crowd and kept the energy high throughout. They did all the right things - let the crowd sing, pulled a girl on stage to do a duet, crazy antics, it was a great night.
Last night I went to a much smaller show, the Mountain Goats at Neumo's with Sean and Justin. They were pretty awesome too. I couldn't tell whether the lead singer was high on something or just plain crazy, but he did keep the crowd entertained. I couldn't understand half of his intros, and I'm still not sure whether that was because I'm clueless, or he was just talking nonsense. Most people there were hardcore Mountain Goats fans, so everyone was singing along and dancing and having fun - it was a great atmosphere.
I should mention that I ironically spent my one year Seattle anniversary in Vancouver - went up with Al, Shivani and Tom for a short weekend visit. It was great as usual - I got to satisfy my Roots obsession (Canucks know how to make warm clothes), and stuff myself silly as per the Vancouver road trip tradition. I had idli-sambar for the first time in over a year (heaven!), ate mahi poke that made me weak at the knees, and of course hit up the simply divine True Confections for their ridiculously good chocolate hazelnut mousse. We also met up with Al's friend Wuhai (sp?), who was pretty cool and made me glad I don't work for Electronic Arts. Sometimes I wish I lived in Vancouver, or that the food in Seattle compared, but it's probably better that neither of those ever happen, because I'll weigh 100 kilos after about 6 months.
So, life is good these days. Work is hectic but in a good way, because I'm enjoying it, and the busyness also makes the work week go really quickly and the weekends come sooner. I can't believe it's already Friday. Plans for the weekend: first cricket training of the spring season, finally hitting up the famous Salty's for Sunday brunch, and some night skiing at Stevens. Talk about the good life.
Today is a momentous day.
The apple juice can sculpture on my desk at work has finally reached perfect 6x6x6 pyramidal form. 56 cans, the ancient Egyptians would be proud. It's all about setting noble goals in life, folks. Stay tuned for the 7x7x7 edition (may take a few months - I don't drink *that* much juice.)
On a less frivolous note, a lot has actually been happening at work. Our team just started on the next major release of our product, Subscription and Commerce Service (SCS) 7.0. I don't talk about work much here, so here's a quick summary. My team, the Subscription and Commerce Group (SCG), is responsible for Microsoft's online monetisation platform. In plain English that means that we provide e-commerce services like credit card processing, subscription management, and so on, that other groups in Windows Live (formerly MSN), as well as our external partners, can plug into to sell things online.
Anyway, after spending a year working on a very obscure backend feature called Payment Gateway (namely the interface between our system and various banks), I'm happy to report that for our next release I'm going to be working on possibly the most visible feature our team owns - Microsoft Points. Ok, so it isn't by any means as instantly recognisable as Office or Windows, but most people who are active Xbox gamers, or own a Zune, or run their small business websites over Office Live, regularly interact with my feature. Basically Points are a digital currency you can use to buy things like songs for your Zune, premium content for your Xbox like extra levels, weapons, and so on.
It's really motivating to work on something which my friends are interacting with (albeit unknowingly) on a daily basis. My neighbour Thejas, who is addicted to his Xbox and whose TV speakers regularly shake our common wall with the rumblings and explosions of Gears of War, was pumped when I told him that I now work on Points. The guy probably spends half his salary on Points, god bless him.
It's also pretty cool to think about all the possibilities of combining our features with the other interesting stuff that's going on in MSFT. For example, late last year another group in Microsoft shipped XNA, a toolkit that anyone can use to develop games for Windows or the Xbox. Combining this with the Points world, could we see a whole new marketplace emerge for Xbox enthusiasts to upload and sell content they've created themselves to other users? Exciting stuff :)
I'm not sure how much I'm allowed to talk about in regards to what we're working on, but there are some interesting things in the works, and with all the MSFT head honchos pushing the "software as a service" doctrine these days, it looks like our team's work is only going to become more important to Microsoft as a whole. Even the Economist is talking about it.
Anyway, enough about work. In other news, I have to find a new place to live. My lease runs out soon, and I've been trawling online classifieds for apartments to rent downtown. Since I seem to spend so much of my spare time in Seattle or wishing I was in Seattle, it makes sense to move there. In an interesting twist of fate, Astha's roommate is taking off to India, possibly for good, and therefore has to move out of their apartment, and Astha asked if I would consider taking her place.
The arrangement does have the potential to be awesome - Astha is a champion and we get on great, so it could be a lot of fun. Her apartment is also gorgeous, in a ridiculously convenient location, and will save me a hell of a lot of money compared to living alone. There is of course the question of whether the fun will continue when we have to be in each other's faces 7 days a week, and how the hell all my stuff, which currently takes up a whole apartment, is going to get consolidated to a single room. A lot of stuff will obviously have to go into storage, but the main issue is, I have gotten used to having my own space, and it will take a bit of adjusting to. I do think it's worth a try though, and the fact that it's a month-by-month arrangement is good - if it really doesn't work out, we're not stuck in a lease.
Some other tidbits:
- My new skis are really doing wonders for me. They are so light and manoeuvrable, I am charging down runs I used to be scared of. I hope we get some good powder in the mountains this week, I want to hit up a black diamond. (Best case scenario: I won't die.)
- Nando's has landed in Seattle. Hallelujah. Hot on its heels - Baker's Delight.
- This is hilarious.
