i made a quick trip to sacramento middle of this week to escape southern california's getting-to-be-warm weather. monday and tuesday were a bit on the really warm side. and it's only march.
the short one hour flight was uneventful. headed to my hotel to check-in and to prepare for the first phoner. yes, i flew all the way to the state's capital for a phoner. hahaha. this was to brief us for the event the foolowing day. anyhow, after that, i strolled a bit and found myself walking near the capitol. some of the streets are lined up with really beautiful flower-bearing trees. f says they are cherry blossoms but i am not convinced yet.
f arrived after about an hour and we strolled further to old town. this was 28 acres of the old sacramento and they were able to preserve it well. it actually looked as if i was inside the universal studios backlot. had dinner at this crab shack called joe's and it was full of people. on a weekday! i found out that this was one of the best seafood places in town.
the following day, j picked me up from san francisco. i was able to change my flight back to los angeles from sacramento to oakland so i could visit my riends in our sf office. m, j & i had dinner at san bruno ihawan, a really nice place that serves really delicious food. we ordered sinampalukang manok, pork sisg and crispy tadyang. woohoo. their sisg's not your usual sisig. it's actually pork inihaw in small cubes served on a sizzling plate. it's very, very good.
bought coffee in burlingame and hung out at m's apartment. around past 1, j and i went home. by 8, we were awake. we had to go to the ofc for me to finish the story i covered. we had plans to have lunch in downtown sf but since my story was a bit more important (hah!), we skipped lunch altogether and he just brought me to the airport around 1:30 to catch my 3 pm flight.
i was in LA around past 4, got to my ofc around 5ish. had a lovely dinner with some friends at palms in hollywood. r's dinner treat because he was promoted as their company's director of operations. yay! congratulations!
Saturday, March 17, 2007
sacramento
Saturday, January 06, 2007
sacramento dining
we only had a day in the state capitol so we had a limited time frame to try the city's offerings. we had coffee and muffins at seattle's best inside the sheraton grand hotel. we had to rush our story so we could meet LA's deadline. i love seattle's best dearly (not comparable to my affection to cbtl though) and i am sad that they do not have stores in LA, like the ones they have all over manila. anyhow.
internet charges at seattle's best was at $4.95 for half an hour. ouch. no way. on our way to the memorial auditorium, we saw an ad at the sacramento convention center right across the street that promises free 15 minutes of internet access for every purchase at starbucks or wolfgang puck express. after writing and editing the story, we moved across the street to starbucks. j bought madeleines and a cup of hot choco. and my fifteen minutes of wi-fi access.
after performing all our duties, we went out and picked up f, an old friend of mine. yeah, he's old. hehehe. old, as in mid-90s friend old. since j and i haven't had breakfast and lunch (coffee and madeleines and muffins do not count), f suggested tower cafe on broadway.
tower cafe is located within the compound of tower theater, where they show artsy and indie films, according to f. across the street was a tower liquor and on the other side was a dilapidated building that used to be tower records. yeah. all towers. a little history lesson: the first tower records in the u.s. was located in this same area.
anyhow, we had a great dinner. i had seafood bouillabaise, f and j had pasta. i always thought that bouillabaise is a cream-based soup so i was quite surprised to see that what i ordered was clear seafood soup, with the clams, prawns, scallops, fish fillet and others. yum.
we wanted to have dessert but previously while at the convention center, i saw a brochure that j picked up. it's a place called 'melting pot' and it's a fondue place. i was transfixed at the chocolate fondue offerings. so off we went to that place. we were quite intrigued with their latest chocolate offering, the hazelnut choco. since i was a big fan of white choco, we decided to get two orders of small, one with teh hazelnut and the other with white chocolate amaretto.
the place was a bit busy when we arrived. they asked if we had reservations. in sacramento? are you freaking kidding me? anyhow, the place was packed around 8ish. i enjoyed this sumptuous dessert so much we had to cancel our second order because we were stuffed. i wish they had a branch in LA. (wishes to the genie of restaurants).
sacramento in one day
j and i drove from san francisco to sacramento to cover the second inaugural ceremony of governor arnold schwarzenegger. ah. work.
we left daly city shortly around 8, and arrived in the capitol less than two hours later. some streets were closed because of this big event so we had to park a few blocks away. we walked towards the sacramento memorial auditorium where the ceremony was going to be held.
there were a few musical numbers that didn't actually matter. some of them even overstayed their welcome mat (hello, mariachi divas!). the program started around 11:30, probably in time for the 12 noon swearing in of the governor. why 12 noon? i have no idea. hehehe.
maria shriver looked splendid in her valentino gown. we were told that the governor was wearing a prada suit and that the bible which was going to be used in the actual swearing in has been with the schwarzenegger family since 1878.
the former mayor of san francisco, willie brown, started the ball rolling by calling all the special guests who would be joing the first family onstage, including the mayors of los angeles, san francisco, sacramento, san jose and other key cities. he also called on eunice kennedy-shriver, maria shriver's mother; then the schwarzenegger kids, then maria shriver. 
then ahnuld appeared onstage. on crutches! poor guy. he broke his thighbone (they say it's upper femur) in a freak skiing accident somewhere in idaho. he took his oath, read his speech (interrupted by applause 13 times!) and that's it.
oh, jennifer holiday also performed "and i am telling you..." and she was fuckin' awesome. oops, sorry. got carried away. j-ho has this tendency to contort her face in order to hit the really high notes but i don't think she minds. she's good. and as willie brown said in his introduction, 'there's no other singer in this world who could give justice to this song aside froim her.' sorry j-hud.
