Restaurant: Empire Cafe

1732 Westheimer Rd
Houston, TX 77098

The TNOX trio got together for a mid-week dinner at the always lovely Empire Cafe. I'm always super looking forward to meeting up with them cos we get to catch up with each other's on goings. One thing I can say is that their company is just so easy and relaxing. Just how things should be. I got to play with Antsylily's kids for a bit. So cute! And so crazy how different they look. Although they're about a year and half apart, the babies are just about the same size. The older one was always smaller and thinner while the new baby is frackin' just shamWOW big baby. Older one also is spitting image of Antsylily while new baby is more than just a spitting image of his pops ... he basically IS the pops! Oy! I can't wait until they're outta diapers! Then I can finally take them places on my own. I'm a bit immature about pooey diapers right now. It was hilarious cos while we were there, the babies pooed simultaneously! They have synced up pooing cycles! Just like women and their menstrual cycles. Haha.

This milky way drink is the BOMB DIGGITY! So frackin GUT!

Not sure what the dishes are called ... but the chicken in my chicken pannini was really good. It was the marination or something.

It's the big little brother.

And the little big brother.

Trippin': Avon - Home

For five days and four nights, this beautiful town home located in Avon was where we called home. Honestly, the photos from the website did not do this place any justice! When we finally arrived, everyone eagerly jumped out of the car and went exploring inside the house. There were three floors. Two bedrooms upstairs, the kitchen and living room were on the ground floor and then the basement had two bedrooms. One of the two bedrooms in the bottom floor slept like five people. That's where big poppa and I stayed along with Miss Truffles and Miss Flower Child. Mister South Face came and went. I kept yelling out with turrets-like fervor, "It's a hostel like situation!". We were all in awe over the picturesque scenery right before our eyes. The snow was fluffy and super white. Not the dirt and yellow kind. The trees in the backyard were lightly dusted with powder and the babbling brook was the cherry on top.

Big poppa and I shared the bottom bunk.

The bottom most floor also has this tele area.

Miss Flower Child the speed skater showing us how to speed skate.

The pow-wow in our room which we all had to face the dreaded question. What do y'all wanna do now?

The iphoners updating the password for the wireless internet.

Trippin': Golden

Golden. A small city/town that lies somewhere between Denver and our final destination. We all stopped here to complete our final packing before heading off again. It was a teeth clenching kinda ride. The icy roads made it hard to drive. The windshield kept getting fogged up and iced over therefore impairing vision. Big poppa drove slowly and steadily and did a superb job. Like a pro! I used to be really good at sorting through all my photos so that I would only post the best. Nowadays, I just put everything up. Ugh! I hate that I do that. I'll do anything for a mindless blog.

Cowboy carrying little Native American girl?

Can you imagine stepping outside and always having this kinda view?

Hungry girls.

Packing the car up.

The mountains gradually went from this:

To this:

Oh Really?: PT Cruiser

This is an ode to the seriously unfortunate PT Cruiser. Does it deserve to get blogged. Yes. And no. Yes because people have the right to know what an unbelievably crappy arse car this is. And no cos socky things don't get the luxury of being in the spotlight. I've had pretty bad luck when it comes to rental cars. Daewoo. Chevy Aveo. And this time, the PT Cruiser. At first when the rental car lady said we would be getting a PT Cruiser, I was like, COOL! I dunno, it looks cute to me! Maybe she gave us that crummy car cos she spent a good fifteen minutes trying to get us to upgrade to a more expensive rental and we kept saying no thanks. Uh hello. My Chinese side makes me cheap and my Vietnamese side likes a good bargain. That's never a good combo. But with big poppa driving through the icy mountain roads of Colorado, we almost regretted not upgrading to a four wheel drive. Luckily, we all made it home safe and sound. And money was saved! Woohoo! Everything about the car is pretty annoying. The car feels really cramped inside for some reason. Instead of the power window operating buttons being right on the inside of the car door, it was on the middle console thing where the radio is. Who does that?!? So we pulled up to the attendant at the rental place and it took us a whole minute to figure out how to roll the windows down, with the attendant laughing at us the whole time. And the car goes at whatever speed that it wants to. You can press the gas down all you want, but you won't accelerate until the car decides that it's time. I think that annoyed the crap outta big poppa. The car started off as this beige color. When we returned it, it was caked in a film of mud. Grossness! It's funny cos now, we see beige PT Cruisers everywhere. And oh boy do we feel bad for them.

I did not notice our license plates til now. It's the double-oh-seven PHAT-mobile!