Finding Khoi in Seattle Part 2

I woke up at in the middle of the night unable to open my eyes. In my sleep I had managed to rub both of my eyes with my hands. Yes… I did wash my hands thoroughly before going to bed. Yes, I washed my hands multiple times. But here I was with around 4 hours of sleep unable to open my eyes fully. They itched horribly and the first reaction would be to rub my eyes. Bad idea it made it worse.

Kelly was still sleeping so I couldn’t exactly ask her to drive me to buy some Visine and Benadryl. Plus I doubt anything would be open at that hour. The best I could do is try to splash water into my eyes and try to wash out the dander. I blindly stumbled my way into the bathroom to wash my eyes and face. I repeat that for  a good 10 minutes before making my way back to bed to check my phone. I was doing that for 10 minutes and whining in bed for another 10 minutes before that so I must’ve woken up around 4am.

Originally I was going to get brunch with Prier, but I was in no shape or form to go South of Seattle before 2pm. It was only 4:30 but I knew that much. I just had to play the waiting game. Wait in bed listening to music until Kelly woke up then ask her to take me to buy eye drops and allergy medication.

A few more trips to the bathroom to wash out my eyes later I was at least able to open them. I open my eyes and realize they’re super red. Yeah, no. I’m keeping my eyes closed and listening to music until Kelly wakes up. I usually get 3-5 hours of sleep a night so this 4 hours wasn’t too bad. Anybody that knows me knows once I’m awake: I’m awake. I won’t be able to fall back asleep until many hours later. I lay in bed listening to Nujabes. I get through Nujabes entire discography before Kelly eventually wakes up.

I tell her I need meds before doing anything today. I go to her bathroom to take a shower but the three cats are just there staring at me. I don’t own cats. I don’t know cat etiquette. Do I shower with the door open so the cats can use the litter box in the bathroom? WHAT IF THE CATS FOLLOW ME INTO THE SHOWER?

“Just close the door. They’ll destroy your clothes if you leave the door open.”

Okay. That’s better. It would be awkward showering with cats in the bathroom with me.

I get into the shower and bump my head into the shower head. Kelly’s like… 4’11. I should’ve looked carefully before entering the shower.  That’s a whole foot difference, of course I’m going to hit something if I don’t look carefully.

I finish up my shower and exit and bump my head again. She also has shelving outside of the shower that I absentmindedly forgot was there. I wish I stopped bumping everything but what can I do? I get dressed and we have some errands to run before doing anything today.

Dexter is a lot less scary in the daytime. He’s just as angry, though. He screamed and stared at me the entire time. Kelly feeds them and we’re on our merry way to buy medication!

We stop by Safeway and I’m able to get some Claritin and Visine. Hopefully these help.

It’s still pretty early before anything opens so Kelly offers to show me her parent’s Koi pond. I fucking love Koi fishes.

One of my goals in life is to own a Koi pond! That’s kinda hard to do in California what with the high cost of land and the whole drought going on. It really was a beautiful Koi pond, though. A lot of large, beautiful Koi fish inhabited her father’s Koi pond. There was also this creepy thing. No thanks I don’t want that.

We decide to get boba/bubble tea since the Thai place she wanted to take me still wasn’t open.

Luckily in that plaza, 2 of her favorite boba/bubble tea places was situated.

I gotta hand it to them, this was some delicious Rose Milk Tea. It was a rainy day in Seattle so this warm milk tea hit the spot before lunch. I normally don’t drink warm drinks because I drink super fast and hot drinks fast is a recipe for burnt tongues and scorched throats. It was nice to sip while waiting for the place we were going to eat lunch opened… Conveniently in the same plaza.

I love Thai food. I used to not like Thai food due to overeating it. An old friend used to live right next to a Thai restaurant and their lazy ass never wanted to go anywhere but there even when I offer to drive… so yeah. I got tired of eating Thai.

It wasn’t actually in 2009 that I learned to love Thai food again. I still don’t like curry or peanut sauce much, but I love the other food that Thai cuisine has to offer.

Thank god I took Claritin earlier. I saw this on their “Special” menu so I decided “Why not?” Fresh, real, non-imitation crab and fried rice served with cucumbers, tomatoes and scallions. Delicious. The portion sizes were HUGE. I’m so used to Los Angeles food where $15 would barely get you enough food to feed a child. This plate of fried rice was more than enough to feed Kelly and myself, but being the fatass I am I ate all of it myself (save for a few bites of crab from Kelly).

I check my phone and see messages from a good friend. Must be important if she keeps messaging right? Nope just an idiot harassing her about something that happened months ago that most sane people forgot. I don’t understand how people can carry on drama by themselves. How does one have drama when you don’t even respond to someone? By being a narcissist. I just tell her to ignore him. Nothing good comes out of responding to someone with their head so far up their ass. This is one of the reasons I went to Seattle, to avoid idiots.

Oh well Kelly’s dish was coming out.

This was Kelly’s dish. Since she was allergic to egg, the fried rice wasn’t for her. The meat was seasoned very well and was not too dry or too wet. Overall? I liked it. The chili sauce they provided for her was delicious as well.

My eyes and throat eventually got better, but it was still bright as hell outside. Even through the clouds it hurt to look clearly.

Kelly mentioned the Asian supermarket near her having “Snowy Moon Cakes.” Frozen desserts? That’s something that definitely caught my attention.

We walk to the Asian supermarket and make our way to the frozen food aisle. There’s only two boxes left.

The pink one is $49.99 and the purple one is $39.99. The purple one has more variety but the pink one has 2 of each (save for one Giant Red Bean and Green Tea) which makes it easier to share.

We bought the pink box and were on our way to the beach.

When I say beach, I don’t mean a sandy beach paradise. I mean.. a place with a shore full of rocks. And honestly, as a fat person who hates going into the water? This was a nice beach for me.

On the way we also saw a random Snail Statue. Don’t ask because neither one of us know the significance.

We finally arrive at Richmond Beach Saltwater Park. It had just finished raining so you could smell the trees. This was definitely not Los Angeles. The air was fresh and crisp and everything was a pleasure to breathe in. We stopped there for a few minutes just to take it all in.

We make our way to a bridge leading to the actual beach from the parking lot.

It was an average bridge. Let’s not hype it up to be something it’s not. It was just a bridge. Ahead is the beach, and to the sides you’re able to see the railroad tracks.

“We’ll go there later,” Kelly informed me. I’m not too big a fan of railroads. Trains are a symbol of great industry in America but they never really improved much over the years to the levels of Europe or modern Asian countries. Plus I know my clumsy ass will somehow do something stupid around the railroad tracks and end up hurting myself. In addition, some of my family members are buried near a railroad crossing. Every time I drive down 182nd to the cemetery I pass by the railroad tracks. Railroads don’t really do it for me.

While walking along the bridge we come across this cute dog.

It’s an Akita and Husky mix. It was a really sweet dog and well behaved. It made me want a dog even more. Me completely responsible for another life? Scary. Friends and medical professionals alike told me a dog would be good for me mentally and physically. A dog would get me exercising more with walks and get my mind off things. Chau thinks dogs are therapeutic. After playing with 2 dogs this weekend, I’m inclined to agree.

We eventually make our way to the beach. From the ramp all the way down to the other end. I’ll just let the pictures do the talking.

We eventually make our way to the far end of the beach. There’s graffiti on the wall and an old man laying down on the rocks reading a book.

There’s a log lying on the beach we can sit down on to eat our Snowy Moon Cakes.

They were delicious mooncakes. I’m not usually a fan of the baked and egg mooncakes but these were more like the ones that my brother-in-law’s mom makes. After eating 3 of them, they honestly remind me of a mixture between the glutinous rice moon cakes, ice cream mochi, and daifuku depending on the filling.

Needless to say, I was a fan. I love frozen desserts so this was no exception. They would have to be outright bad for me to not like them.

We sat on that beach taking in the surroundings for an hour or so. Not really much to be said. I really needed this.

It’s why I wanted to come to Seattle. I needed to get away from everybody and everything. De-stress. Take some time to myself. Of course, Kelly was here but it’s not like she stresses me. It was just nice to take in nature with the good air and clear skies… Basically not LA.

It sounds stupid coming from someone who spends most of his time looking at his phone’s screen or a computer screen but I really did enjoy the time spent on the beach. It was probably the highlight of the trip for me. Well one of the highlights.

Shiro’s calls and confirms the reservation for dinner. I almost didn’t pick up because the number was unfamiliar, but thank god I did. A reservation for 6 people is hard to come by.

Here’s some more pictures of the beach.

We notice a bunch of ants on the log so we decide to head back… but Kelly was adamant on showing me the railroad tracks first. Like I said earlier I wasn’t a fan of railroad tracks.

As we got closer I really didn’t want to see the tracks. It wasn’t a paved path, it was just a trail with trees, bushes and shrubs close on both sides. It had recently rained and I was wearing Vans. I’ve rolled my ankles one too many times to get the feeling this will happen again.

As we make our way through the trees, branches and leaves hit my face. Being much taller than Kelly I also walk into a bunch of spiderwebs I thought she would clear out. I hate spiders. We finally get through and make our way to the railroad tracks.

After the railroad track we headed back to get MORE boba. This time from Kiki’s Bakery.

I got the passionfruit and mango black tea and she got the peach black tea. It was pretty good! I love passionfruit. It’s probably my favorite flavor (the fruit itself is too much of a pain most of the time, though.)

After boba we decided to go to the mall. I had so much time until dinner we decided to walk around and buy things. I couldn’t find the shoes I was looking for but Kelly was able to buy stuff from Hot Topic and the weeb store. Also this happened… It was Kelly’s idea I swear. Sailor Mars is the hottest, though.

After our little mall detour, there was so much traffic into Downtown Seattle that Kelly didn’t want to drive there so I decided to Uber. First Uber of the trip!

$17 from Northgate to Downtown so Kelly doesn’t have to put with the traffic. The Uber driver was super chill. He codes at Amazon during the day and Ubers in his spare time.

Traffic in Seattle is as bad as people say it is. It was terrible, but luckily it gave me time to message Sharon. Sharon had offered to let me stay with her at the Westin on Saturday and Sunday night. I would have stayed with her Friday night as well but her flight didn’t get in until like 11pm. Plus I wanted to spend some time with Kelly.

I get to the Westin and Sharon and Henry bring me to the room so I can drop off my stuff. It was still 3 hours until dinner. What do I do in the meantime? Sharon was going to go shopping and Henry had to get to Bellvue. We get lost and walk around a bit. We took some weird photos of some balls before eventually leaving Sharon where she was going to meet up with her friend.

Maybe watch a movie? Nope we missed all the good showings or I’d be late for dinner. Henry and I decide to play some games at Gameworks but… most of them were old or they sucked.

We wait for some crappy sit down shooter for 10 minutes but a couple cuts us in line and makes us wait another 10. HOPEFULLY THIS GAME IS GOOD RIGHT? Nope it sucks. It’s basically poor enemy placement and bullet sponges that attempt to milk you for all your game credits.

We try to play some Metal Slug. Everybody loves Metal Slug right? Nope… It’s on a crappy CRT and not scaled correctly. The screen has a yellow tint and a lot of the information is cut off due to poor scaling and displaying.

How about Tatsunoko vs Capcom? Nope. I suddenly remember why I stopped liking the Capcom vs. Series, especially Tatsunoko vs Capcom. It was too simple. Simple is fun but not this level of simple when it comes to fighting games. Button mashing let me take away 50% of Henry’s health. Real balance.

Henry decides to take off and I hit up Gina to find out what we’re doing before dinner. Gina’s at Wann Izakaya with other friends pre-eating before dinner.

It’s only half a mile away so I decide to walk it. It was still light out at 8 and it was a nice day outside. I make the walk from Gameworks to Wann. It was good exercise!

I get there and call up Gina to find out where they’re seated. The hostess looks confused as to why I keep peeking into booths and at tables until I see Gina and other friends seated in the back! Luckily, happy hour is all day!

I order Yuzu ice tea (yuzu shochu and oolong tea) while other friends order food. I had to save my stomach for Shiro’s… but the yakitori catches my eye so I order some for myself.

It looks like a lot of food, but all I ate was like 1/3rd of the Yakitori and half of the Tempura Banana dessert that I split with Gina. It took a while for our food to come out 🙁 It felt like they forgot about us but I guess the kitchen was just being hammered. This gave me time to locate everybody to make sure they know dinner is at 9:30pm at Shiro’s.

I try to see if Chau’s awake. I know she’s tired from work so she probably napped afterwards. She’s awake. I let her rest since there’s still at least 45 minutes until dinner.

I try to see if Sharon’s done shopping. She sprained her ankle while shopping and is now chilling with Hai. That answers where Hai is.

Gina tries to see where Blake is. Blake’s chilling. Cool. All 6 people are accounted for. Gina, Chau, Sharon, Hai, Blake and myself for dinner at Shiro’s at 9:30pm.

The Yuzu iced tea wasn’t too strong. I didn’t feel any buzz from it. The yakitori was okay. The tempura banana, though? It was delicious. Unfortunately I didn’t want to be too full for Shiro’s so I didn’t eat lot of it. This was one of the reasons why I flew out to Seattle, Shiro’s omakase with Gina and Chau!

We settled everything at Wann’s and made our way to Shiro’s.

I think I need like 2 more posts after this. Most of the food porn is in Part 3. I’ll hopefully finish part 3 by Tuesday. I need to ask Gina the name of all the fishes and dishes 😀