Early (for a Saturday) this morning I woke up and took Devon out to the dog park for some play time. He played with Rosie the bulldog for over an hour and had a blast. Afterwards we went back home, I fed him, and started getting ready for the day.
My friends Nora and Jen came over from Sacramento. From here, we drove out to a Malaysian restaurant in Cupertino called Layang Layang (which I guess means "kite"). We had lunch with our friends Peter and Wei (my ex-roommate). Had a nice lunch. We shared some of that roti flatbread that you dip in curry sauce, beef rendang, belachan kangkung, hainan chicken, and some kind of fish in tamarind sauce.
After lunch, Nora, Jen, and I went to Valley Fair Mall to walk around for a bit. The girls also needed to buy a housewarming present for some other friends of ours. On the way to the mall, Nora was driving. She kept making comments about how other people drove, while Jen kept making comments about how Nora was driving. It was nonstop bickering between the two of them. Kind of amusing, like old, sassy married couples you see on TV or in the movies. Nora then asked if Bill and I were like that in a car. I said no, because most of the time Bill drives and I'm totally relaxed in the passenger seat. I like being driven around. LOL
We relaxed a bit at home after leaving the mall. We played with Snorty McDoggelsson and just sat around for about an hour. Then we drove to Kevin & Cuong's housewarming party.
Kevin and Cuong bought a house about two years ago, and have spent all the time since then remodeling and decorating it to their tastes. The house is in Willow Glen, a charming neighborhood in San Jose where the houses' modest sizes belie their very high prices. They bought a 2-bedroom, 2-bath home with a detached garage. After a couple of additions and extensive renovations, they now have a 3-bedroom, 3-bath home with a detached garage and studio (Cuong is a very talented artist who makes paintings and chalk drawings).
The house was very nicely decorated, inside and out. Each room looked like it came out of the pages of a magazine or a high-end home furnishings catalog. It was the perfect size for two people, with plenty of room for overnight guests. The master bedroom opened out to a deck and onto the backyard, which was a very cozy affair with patches of grass, a trellis, and a fountain.
There were a lot of people at the houswarming - friends and colleagues of the homeowners. Nora, Jen, and I met up with Larry and Hunter, and we all just pretty much grazed on the awesome food (including lots of pate de foie gras straight from Paris), drank a lot of wine, and hung out.
Everyone was asking me about Bill - how he's doing, when I'm gonna see him again, etc, etc. Larry and Nora both said that they missed him and that the party would have been much more fun had he been around. I think he would have enjoyed it, definitely.
Nora and I talked to another Filipino at the party, and we gamely discussed whether it's better to retire in the Philippines or here in the US. The guy voted for the Philippines, I voted for the US, and Nora was ambivalent.
One of Cuong's coworkers was talking to me about Google Earth, and from there our conversation segued into my Iceland vacation with Bill. At first he made fun of our choice of vacation spots. "Normal people pick someplace warm," he said. But after I regaled him with descriptions of picture-perfect neighborhoods, friendly people, heart-attack-inducing food prices, and breathtaking scenery, he was sold. "Maybe I'll check it out sometime," he conceded.
We didn't stay very late, since the girls had to drive back to Sacramento. They dropped me off at home, I took the dog out for a walk, and took a short nap. So here I am, at 11 PM, wide awake and debating on whether I should read a book or try to go to bed for the night.