Thank you all for being so patient.  I know how you wait around for my next update, hoping that today's trip into work will have some value in that you can read about my recent 'adventures' in crusty, dry narrative.

Truth be told, because it's been so long since my last update (real update.. not that lumpy mess that I passed as an update through my ureter a few days ago - my apologies to current and past kidney stone sufferers), this update will proceed from most recent event.  If you want to read about the beginning of August.. drop down a bit, look for the end... and just read up.  See?  How easy could it get?  Okay, I'll be straight - that's the plan, but knowing my writing style, who knows where it'll end up going.  Just read the damn thing - I'll get to your favorite parts, eventually :)  Update: your favorite part has been removed.  Sorry.

This morning (it's morning 'cause I haven't taken a shower yet and just finished a late breakfast) has been busy and lazy at the same time.  I've been a beast in the kitchen the last few days, spending more time washing dishes and chopping that.. well just about anything else.  Let's start with a good warmup - here's some pictures of my breakfast:

This morning I was finishing up a chicken soup (from a stock I had created yesterday from a whole roasted chicken I made for lunch) and I decided to put together a little fancy breakfast. The egg dish is a spinach and sausage (jalapeno-mango chicken/turkey sausage) frittata with caramelized onions and a little bit of sharp cheddar cheese.  The other dish is roasted sweet potatoes and yams with shallots and a bit of heirloom varietal purple garlic, rosemary and a slight bit of olive oil.  The coffee is single origin, locally roasted Ethiopian Yergecheffe.

Here's the cool thing. The only added fat is the bit of cheddar cheese (maybe 1/3 of an oz) and the olive oil, less than a tsp. The sausage is plenty fatty though and resulted in a rich, yet still light dish that was really yummy.  The yield was somewhat greater than the pictures show.. but I am currently devouring the last little bits - so sorry, no hope for bumming my leftovers.

By the way, for the true devotees, you may notice that the style of my posting is slightly different and it may evoke an image of some of my first postings (the drop shadows on the embedded pictures, for example).  The reason is that I am essentially between browsers, so I'm using the stand-alone Windows Live Writer.  It's a great program that picks up your styles from the existing content so it looks right.  When I say I'm between browsers, I'm currently running Beta 2 of Internet Explorer 8 alongside Firefox 3.  The fancy photo tools that Microsoft has embedded in its Live Spaces don't yet work with IE 8... or Firefox.  So, if I didn't just want to dump pictures at the bottom, I had to use another route.    Btw.. for the devotees out there, IE 8, when it renders a page at all, the browser is fantastic.  The problem is that at this stage I have found 1 or 2 sites where specific content just doesn't show up.  It has a built-in compatibility setting which is kinda neat too, so it'll render like IE7 - so you click the button and it'll use the old rendering engine while they work the kinks out for the final release.  It's got some neat features and it's really quick.  If they can iron out some of the kinks, it may be a contender for my primary browser again.

Sorry for the little detour there.  So, more food.  I roasted a whole chicken yesterday and rendered the carcass into a lovely stock (I was up 'til midnight finishing it up), which today got built into a likely wonderful chicken soup.  I may be poor, but I still try to cook and eat well.  Added to my stock was a nicely sauteed mirapois (carrots, onions, and celery, silly), a wild, brown, and red rice mix, and a good pile of roasted chicken from the finished product.  Should be tasty.  I don't feel like soup at all now though.. hah!

Saturday night, Tobin, the owner of Mad Hat Tea company came over for dinner and after he closed the shop up.  We had some nice curried roasted vegetables and chicken and a salad.  No, we didn't have salad, actually - we forgot it.  And I had made this really wonderful dressing with tarragon, kefir, and garlic infused rice vinegar.  Oh well.. it was good yesterday instead.  It was fun to have him over - he's the first dinner guest I've had.  He was infatuated with my cookware and knife (<cough>).  We had a decent bottle of Cabernet from TJs (I was a little worried about it - I hadn't tried it before and Tobin was a high-end wine buyer for nearly 10 years - but it turned out to be just fine).  He perused my media library and decided on like 50 movies he wanted.  We watched an episode of Space Ghost (he'd never seen it) and listed to some good music while having a nice chat.  All this without a dining table or a second chair - take that formalists!

Tobin's an interesting guy.  I think he's probably in his late 30s or early 40s.  He's separated from the co-owner of the tea shop, Maureen, who I see there all the time.  They have 3 or 4 children together and were actually married for 18 years.  He routinely claims he doesn't drink yet happily shared half a bottle of wine and a beer while over.  I go over to his shop maybe once or twice a week and end up spending the better part of the day there.  There are always interesting people milling in and out and I end up interfacing with the customers as if I'm the owner - telling them about teas and which I like and finding out about which they like and making suggestions for what they should try.  It's a great shop, but I know it must be very hard to keep open in the middle of Tacoma, where the tea culture is still rather immature.

A couple of weeks ago, Uncle Jerry visited me for 3 days, which was definitely a fun little adventure.  We spent a day up in Seattle.  We took a great walk around Greenlake and wandered around downtown and punctuated the day with an unbelievably good meal at Miyabi sushi in Southcenter. 

So good in fact, I published the following review on a popular online restaurant review website:

"I've now been to Miyabi 3 times in the last 6 months and each time has been better than the rest.  Most recently, my uncle took me out for dinner there this week while he was visiting.  We ordered the Chef's Special (you choose the amount - we said $35 each) of both sushi and sashimi.  The result was sublime. 
First they brought us the sashimi.  Aside from tuna, yellowtail, and salmon, everything on the plate was a premium item and prepared with the utmost care and quality (the salmon, tuna, and yellowtail were no exception here!).  Dogfish, surf clam, fatty tuna, scallops, sea bass, flounder, squid and a couple others adorned our sashimi platter.  It would have been a bargain even if it had been lousy sashimi.  This, gladly, wasn't the case at all - everything was choice.
I questioned the decision to bring the sashimi platter first, but my concerns were assuaged when when the sushi platter was ever fancier: sweet shrimp (they even fried the heads for us and served it as a little bonus at the end of the meal), toro-tataki, salmon roe, and 6 or 7 other excellent items.  Between the two platters, there was plenty for 3 people with our order and everything was fantastic.  One of the best sushi meals I've ever had and it was $70 (plus tax and tip).  I've spent $85 (granted that included sake and beer) on my own and not gotten quite that assortment.  Wow.
I've had two different chefs: one was definitely the more experienced, skilled of the two, but both provided an excellent experience.  They have a lovely premium sake assortment, a great staff, plenty of free parking.  On the downside, it's in Southcenter, so it's not the best location in the world.  I won't complain about that - any failure for location is made up by the experience. 
It's my sushi place to beat up in the Puget Sound region."

It was fun to have time with Jerry and we managed to keep pretty busy during his stay.  We even cooked at home a few times (mainly me making some of my famous breakfasts)

The job front is still pretty grim.  I'm doing what I can - I'm trying to get to every bar related function which will have me to get my name out there.  I've met with the head of the Tacoma-Pierce County Bar Association and she has my resume and information.  I've made a few contacts with some state agencies, but the state hiring freeze will likely make most of those fruitless for now.  I'll keep at it.

I'm going to need to find an interim job though - I haven't worked a single day in nearly 3 weeks and it's not good for the 'bottom line'.  It has been good for finishing Bioshock.. and Sin: Emergence, and for playing dozens of hours of Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword :)

I haven't watched much Jdrama recently - I've been working on a new show that's really great, but I've just been taking it real slow.

Okay.. I'm done typing.  I'm gonna go clear up the kitchen of the breakfast aftermath and take a shower.  I hope LA Fitness is open today.. I'm really looking forward to a good workout later!

Enjoy your days off, those of you poor souls who "work for a living".  If you need me, I'll be in the refrigerator box eating... part of the refrigerator box.