July 2001 in the Journal of Frank Farm

July 2001

Summary: Patrick and I dine at Empress of China. I meet Sam. I start working at UCSF. Patrick gets laid off from wcities.com. Sister Theresa and Sister Michael come to dinner. Chris De Lay visits from Seattle.

Dates on this page

Sun Jul 1, 2001

Work for Marcia. Patrick sees Tomb Raider with Sam. Ants climbing up a tree for dinner (but with chicken instead of pork).

Mon Jul 2, 2001

Woke early and made pumpkin bread. Hired by UCSF School of Pharmacy. Hooray! First day of work is Monday, July 16. Patrick talks to Mitchell Waters of Curtis Brown Ltd who wants to see all of Patrick's work. Hooray! We go to Empress of China for a celebration dinner. We have the China Gourmet dinner. For $39.95 per person, we got: sai see gai (empress chicken salad), kuo teh (peking pot sticker), baby quail flambé, sizzling rice soup, beef canton (cubes of sirloin of beef sauteed with fresh chinese vegetables in wine sauce), lobster see jup (lobster with shell sauteed in see jup sauce, minced pork, green pepper, and onions), empress fried rice, vanilla ice cream with lychee nuts and dragon eyes, bouquet tea, and chinese fortune cookies. Patrick's fortune said, "You will be wise not to seek too much from others." My fortune said, "Your happiness is intertwined with your outlook on life." The most amazing thing about this dinner was the timing. There must have been no more than 2 minutes between each course. The food was excellent.

Tue Jul 3, 2001

Paperwork and bill-paying at home. Patrick gets a haircut and shops in the Castro for a new outfit for the forthcoming Air concert. Today we signed up with the Direct Marketing Association Mail and Telephone Preference Services to reduce the amount of junk mail and the number of unsolicited phone calls we get. The registration is good for 5 years, so it expires for us around, say, July 10, 2006.

Wed Jul 4, 2001

Fourth of July. Patrick went to Stonestown Mall with Sam. Reformatted the web server. A trip to Office Depot for a network card.

Thu Jul 5, 2001

Stir-fried chicken with fresh basil for lunch. We reformatted and printed Patrick's collection of short stories for Mitchell Waters. A trip to two Office Depots for printer cartridges and other office supplies. Grocery shopping at Safeway. Grocery shopping at Tower Market. Stopped at the bakery next to Tower Market for the first time. We have a cinnamon roll and enjoy the friendly and helpful staff. Reorganized file of important papers. Patrick sees some of Frank's childhood photos for the first time.

Fri Jul 6, 2001

Work on the web server. Errands in West Portal. Patrick and I watch Muriel's Wedding on DVD.

Sat Jul 7, 2001

Repaired the peeling paint and rust stain in the bathroom medicine cabinet. Sam and John come over for dinner for the first time. We have shredded chicken with cellophane noodles, asparagus with crab meat, braised beef with garlic, dark cherry sorbet, green tea ice cream, chinese pastries, and fortune cookies. We play one round of a game called Chop Stix. Patrick and I watch The Cider House Rules on DVD.

Sun Jul 8, 2001

I proofread the manuscripts that Patrick will soon send to Mitchell Waters. Sam and Janet come over for lunch. Patrick and I walk to West Portal to return the DVDs. For dinner we have leftovers from last night.

Mon Jul 9, 2001

I mailed Patrick's package to Mitchell Waters. Organized lots of stuff in the closets. Switched the garage lock around. Chatted with Marcia briefly. Made a stir-fry for dinner. Patrick goes to the Air concert at the Warfield with Aaron.

Tue Jul 10, 2001

Slept a lot today (!). Shopped for a new keyboard.

Wed Jul 11, 2001

I did more research on the web server today, decided I needed a different network card. Shopped for a new computer for Marcia. Patrick and I played Descent 3 for the first time over the network. We played a few different missions, but our favorite was Monsterball. Martin came over today to fix the toilet. Dinner at Jitra with Patrick: some beef dish, and shrimp and scallops hot pot.

Thu Jul 12, 2001

Saw A.I. at UA Colma then lunch at Eric's with Patrick: asparagus beef and broccoli beef lunch plates. Painted touch-ups around the house.

Fri Jul 13, 2001

Chris found the network card I need today. Hooray! I am saved! Patrick and I ate dinner at Benihana of Tokyo of Japantown of San Francisco. It was our first time at a Benihana. It was plenty of fun and the food was pretty good as well. After that, we tried to see Final Fantasy at the Kabuki Theatre but there were too many people and so we got a refund. We dropped in on Brian and Kelly and chatted in the kitchen. Eric and Brian also stopped in.

Sat Jul 14, 2001

I cut my hair today. Patrick and I lunch at the Beach Chalet (mushroom burger, bbq chicken sandwich) then go to Tina and Daniel's in Sonoma for their bon voyage party (Chrisbo, Nancy, Xavier, Savory, Andreas, Eric, Steve and baby, Nicky, Brendan, Shannie, Jason, Andrea, and a neighbor of Tina and Daniel's whose name we didn't catch).

Sun Jul 15, 2001

Brunch at New Loi's. Grocery shopping at Andronico's. Nap. Dinner at home.

Mon Jul 16, 2001

Today is my first day of work at UCSF. I met the staff in the office I'm in, Cindy took me to lunch at ? in Laurel Heights, and Helen in Human Resources helped me through the mountain of paperwork. Patrick learns today that wcities is laying him off in two weeks.

Tue Jul 17, 2001

Lunch at Panda Express.

Wed Jul 18, 2001

Lunch at Subway.

Thu Jul 19, 2001

I ate lunch at Pomelo for the first time. This is a great little restaurant. When it's busy there can be a small wait, but it's well worth it. I had manila and a ginger-lemongrass iced tea. Patrick makes dinner for Sister Theresa, Sister Michael, and me. We have transparent noodles with steamed shrimp, Hoisin chicken, and for dessert a custard fruit pie from Ambrosia Bakery. We drove them back to their convent, then picked up some keys from Sam.

Fri Jul 20, 2001

After work, Patrick and I were to meet at Carta for dinner. I caught an N Shuttle and a grumpy old man was sitting directly behind the bus driver. The bus was really crowded. When someone in the back yelled, "Back door, please!" the grumpy man would yell, "Wouldya open the back door?!" to the bus driver even though the bus driver already heard the other person. And the grumpy man would continue: "You need to press your buzzer to open the back door!" When he wasn't looking, other people looked at each other, rolled their eyes, and smiled. Our dinner at Carta was excellent except for one thing: the menu was printed with absolutely no regard to proper page design. Script typefaces were used in all caps, lines weren't centered properly, some lines had two or more spaces where there should have been one, graphics had jaggies, and so on. Patrick had a vermicelli vegetable soup with pesto, roasted vegetables with olive oil, baby chicken with collard greens and portabello mushrooms, and a mango ice cream cake. I had vegetable fritters and tournedos of beef with creamed spinach. We saw a drag queen with what must have been 12-inch heels. After dinner, we saw the musical revue called "Forever Plaid" at the New Conservatory Theatre at 25 Van Ness.

Sat Jul 21, 2001

Today Patrick and I picked up photos at Wolf Camera. We stopped at Starbuck's to look at the photos, and I burned my tongue on the soy grande caramel macchiato I ordered. We then shopped in the Haight. I found some jeans at the Gap, and Patrick found a bag to carry his laptop. Patrick found The Nature of Alexander by Mary Renault for $1.00 at a used book store. We had lunch at Best of Thai Noodle, which was a rather ordinary experience except for the annoying noise of the chef clanging his spatula against the frying pan every ten seconds to knock food off the spatula. We napped. Dinner with Sam and John at Sam's place. We had Chinese cabbage salad, Chinese barbecued chicken, Chinese pork, stir-fried bittermelon, steamed broccoli, rice with shiitake mushrooms, white flesh peaches, fortune cookies, and cookies from Ambrosia.

Sun Jul 22, 2001

Patrick went to Jumpin' Java with his new backpack. I organized paperwork, did laundry, and tried fixing the toilet.

Mon Jul 23, 2001

Patrick comes home from work early and stops by Papenhausen Hardware for toilet parts. Patrick makes pot roast for dinner. Patrick sees the South Park "Spirit of Christmas" episode for the first time. I fixed the toilet, which was still not working properly.

Tue Jul 24, 2001

Patrick meets me for lunch at work. We go to Pomelo. I have the fried rice and Patrick has the transparent noodles I had last time. After work, we go to Walgreen's for toothpaste and aluminum foil, Patrick organizes his CDs, and we prepare our new wills.

Wed Jul 25, 2001

Leftovers for lunch and dinner. Played Descent 3 with Chris (renegade) and Patrick (macondo).

Thu Jul 26, 2001

I am surprised how long it has taken me to learn something very important about San Francisco. Something that I would have found insightful before I moved here. The weather in San Francisco is like a Hydra that you can easily escape by car but which will always catch you on foot. One head of the Hydra is a baking sun, one is a phlegmatic fog, one is a whimsical rain. I realize now that I prefer the consistency of a single-headed evil, even though it may, on the surface, appear to offer more doom and more gloom. Today Patrick and I ate schwarmas at Yumma's and then shopped for groceries at Andronico's rather late in the evening. We were exhausted when we got home.

Fri Jul 27, 2001

Chris visits from Seattle. We go to Jitra for dinner: chicken satay, bbq pork for frank, mussman beef (curry) for chris, non-spicy spicy shrimp with eggplant. Afterwards, we stayed in and caught up. Chris forgot to take out his contact lenses when he went to sleep.

Sat Jul 28, 2001

Breakfast at home: hash browns, sausage, eggs, crescent rolls, P.J.'s coffee from New Orleans. We went to Sony Metreon because Chris had never been. Chris and Patrick played in the virtual reality pods (Badlands). We visited the Metreon shops (Microsoft Store, Playstation Store, Sony Style). An Aibo in the Sony Store liked Chris's red shirt. The Pluto Festival (performance art) in Yerba Buena Gardens. Lunch in Nirvana in the Castro. Chatted with Brian and Kelly at their place—we found out they just bought a house at 15th and Church. Picked up a video (Charlie's Angels on DVD) from Superstar. We listened to rare Madonna remixes. We listened to archived telephone messages.

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