easy like sunday morning

that's a line from an old hit by the commodores, which spawned the solo career of lionel richie.  kids won't know him today.  easy was also remade by faith no more but it was almost an exact copy of the original - as in the arrangements. could have been better.  but i digress.

anyway, the point of the title was that after all the hectic stuff of the week, today was an opportunity to just chill out.  spoke on skype and then made my way down for breakfast. but the hot food still wasn't out yet.  it only comes out at 9.30 on sundays.  so i had oatmeal (the only exception to the rest of the cold stuff on offer - guess you don't really need to cook oatmeal), a croissant, fruit, carrot juice and coffee.  not in that order.  the juices are really good.  it is really so easy to eat healthy here.

vijay and i were thinking of eating in by taking some stuff from the brunch, which was supposed to close at 11 or 11.30 but then ping-soon suggested dim sum and so we went.  he biked there (he rented a bike for the entire program) and we took a cab.

the restaurant is called tai pan.  it's in downtown palo alto along waverley street.

ping soon found a recommendation for the place and it was really good.  there were local chinese eating there - always a good sign.  again i was hungry and forgot to take pictures until it was almost too late.  one of the better dishes, which i unfortunately did not take a picture of, was pumpkin fried with salted egg.  other dishes we had included fried tofu, vegetable dumpling, beef ball, and these two.

the top picture is of carrot cake (or as it has called here, turnip cake) fried in XO sauce, and the lower picture is sesame seed ball.  there is an excellent website with more pictures.  tai pan

after such a heavy meal, i of course had to go and run.  you can read about it in the other blog.

then time for dinner.  i keep getting caught off balance but i think i see a pattern now.  whenever the professor is present and due to address us, dinner is served to us.  otherwise it is a buffet.  or maybe not.  i think there was one day where i was a little late but dinner was on the lazy susan.  ok, maybe i still have not figured it out yet.  so as i walked into the dining room, i see empty chairs but with a bowl of soup there with a piece of bread sticking out of it.  i assume the seat's taken and move on.  and then one of the waiters ushers me to a seat with the soup and bread also there and i realise that we are being served and that was the first course which they brought out early.  it turns out to be a cold soup - tomato.  which was good seeing as i had just finished a run and was still perspiring.  main course was tuna, quite a big portion which i didn't finish - usually i can't eat much after running.  but the dessert was good and i then remembered to take a picture:)

i didn't bring my glasses so not sure what it is exactly but it is some kind of custard.   it tastes as good as it looks.  and finally after doing laundry this morning (i am still learning about it) this is what my room looks like.

i have of course cleared up most of it since the picture was taken.  but i learnt that i should have dried my clothes in the dryer for a longer time as most of the thicker clothes were still slightly wet.  i ended up ironing some of them, and then hanging them up as can be seen here.