Name: neener
School: USC Marshall School of Business
Status: Employed...finally
E-mail: Click here!
Reason for blogging: I'm incredibly self-absorbed.
I'm listening to...
::"Stay Beautiful," The Last Goodnight
::"Spaceman," The Killers
::"Green Light," John Legend
::"Superstar," Lupe Fiasco

I'm watching...
::24
::The Office

I'm reading...
::Taiwan, A Political History, by Denny Roy
::The Devil and Miss Prym, by Paulo Coehlo

I've just seen...
::Slumdog Millionaire
::I Love You, Man
::The Reader
06/01/2003 - 07/01/2003
07/01/2003 - 08/01/2003
08/01/2003 - 09/01/2003
09/01/2003 - 10/01/2003
10/01/2003 - 11/01/2003
11/01/2003 - 12/01/2003
12/01/2003 - 01/01/2004
01/01/2004 - 02/01/2004
02/01/2004 - 03/01/2004
03/01/2004 - 04/01/2004
04/01/2004 - 05/01/2004
05/01/2004 - 06/01/2004
06/01/2004 - 07/01/2004
07/01/2004 - 08/01/2004
08/01/2004 - 09/01/2004
09/01/2004 - 10/01/2004
10/01/2004 - 11/01/2004
11/01/2004 - 12/01/2004
12/01/2004 - 01/01/2005
01/01/2005 - 02/01/2005
02/01/2005 - 03/01/2005
03/01/2005 - 04/01/2005
04/01/2005 - 05/01/2005
05/01/2005 - 06/01/2005
06/01/2005 - 07/01/2005
07/01/2005 - 08/01/2005
08/01/2005 - 09/01/2005
09/01/2005 - 10/01/2005
10/01/2005 - 11/01/2005
11/01/2005 - 12/01/2005
12/01/2005 - 01/01/2006
01/01/2006 - 02/01/2006
02/01/2006 - 03/01/2006
03/01/2006 - 04/01/2006
04/01/2006 - 05/01/2006
05/01/2006 - 06/01/2006
06/01/2006 - 07/01/2006
07/01/2006 - 08/01/2006
08/01/2006 - 09/01/2006
09/01/2006 - 10/01/2006
10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006
11/01/2006 - 12/01/2006
12/01/2006 - 01/01/2007
02/01/2007 - 03/01/2007
03/01/2007 - 04/01/2007
04/01/2007 - 05/01/2007
05/01/2007 - 06/01/2007
07/01/2007 - 08/01/2007
08/01/2007 - 09/01/2007
06/01/2008 - 07/01/2008
09/01/2008 - 10/01/2008
10/01/2008 - 11/01/2008
11/01/2008 - 12/01/2008
02/01/2009 - 03/01/2009
03/01/2009 - 04/01/2009
04/01/2009 - 05/01/2009
05/01/2009 - 06/01/2009
06/01/2009 - 07/01/2009
07/01/2009 - 08/01/2009
08/01/2009 - 09/01/2009
09/01/2009 - 10/01/2009
11/01/2009 - 12/01/2009
12/01/2009 - 01/01/2010
02/01/2010 - 03/01/2010
04/01/2010 - 05/01/2010
05/01/2010 - 06/01/2010
06/01/2010 - 07/01/2010
07/01/2010 - 08/01/2010
08/01/2010 - 09/01/2010
09/01/2010 - 10/01/2010
10/01/2010 - 11/01/2010
11/01/2010 - 12/01/2010
07/01/2011 - 08/01/2011
10/01/2011 - 11/01/2011
12/01/2011 - 01/01/2012
02/01/2012 - 03/01/2012
03/01/2012 - 04/01/2012
Thursday, May 06, 2010
 
The World Is My Oyster.  
Or is it the other way around? Well, on a recent Saturday, it did seem like the other way around. After a long stretch of rainy, overcast days, we finally got a beautiful sunny day in the Bay Area. YJ drove Megs, Lan, and me to Point Reyes National Seashore for some hiking and Tomales Bay oysters. We chose a relatively flat, five-mile hike (300 ft in elevation) called the Coast Trail - Laguna Loop. As the name suggests, the trail takes you to the coast, and you can access the beach via a small path off of the trail.

point reyes national sea shore

There were wooded areas at the beginning and end of the loop, but the coast areas were mostly just grass. According to their hiking guide, technically there is a "riparian zone," which I looked up because I don't know what it means (it means near the banks of a stream), in addition to coastal scrub and grassland.

flowers along coast trail

flowers along coast trail

Even though Megs was recovering from an injured ankle, she still booked it and was way ahead of the rest of us. Thanks for making me feel lame, Megs. Anyway, we took a snack break at the beach and started heading back to the trailhead. At one point, a bunch of big birds appeared. At first I couldn't figure out what they were, but I could make out their big beaks. I thought maybe they were pelicans, but I wasn't sure because the word brings to my mind a cartoonish version of a bird with a bunch of fish in its beak pouch thing. But after looking at a picture of them at one of the signs near the trail, I concluded that they were, indeed pelicans.

pelicans

So we kept walking. And walking. And walking. And at one point, I was thinking that maybe we had missed a turn. It just so happened that we bumped into a fellow hiker, who told us we had missed our turn. He said we could either double-back and finish the trail as planned, or we could turn at a different spot and take a different path back that had "the best views" and had an elevation of 1,000 ft. I told him that one person in our party had a recovering injury, so we would probably take our original route. But to be honest, my non-injured self wasn't really feeling walking 1,000 ft up. He shrugged and said, possibly with a hint of disdain for our non-athletic ways, "You'll have fun either way." Out loud, I said, "Thanks," but I actually was thinking, "I really think I'll have way more fun on the flat path versus the giant hill."

So we doubled back and ended up walking maybe 6 miles instead of 5 miles. The way back to the car was not without its moments. There was a point in the ascent where my mind went into the "I don't think I can climb any more but I refuse to be this lame" zone, and then at another point we had to traverse this extremely muddy patch. I ended up sinking in the mud and getting it all over my pants and shoes. Good times.

We rushed back to the car and started driving very quickly because we were afraid we wouldn't make it to any of the Tomales Bay oyster places, which close pretty early. Hog Island Oyster Company was closed, so we high-tailed it to Tomales Bay Oyster Company. We got there just in time with less than an hour before closing. Even though we had discussed in the car that we should not buy too many oysters, we still ended up buying the bag of 50 --- that's right, FIVE-OH --- because the per unit savings was too much for our Asian selves to resist. We got back to the car, opened the mini-cooler, and encountered a problem. My mini-cooler couldn't accommodate all 50 oysters.

oh no! it won't fit!

What to do? Eat the overflow until we can close the damn cooler. So Megs (the expert shucker) and YJ start shucking, and all four of us, standing by the trunk of YJ's car parked alongside the road, start slurping away.

megs

Not the most sophisticated ambiance, but you gotta do what you gotta do. After we'd eaten enough so that the bag fit in the cooler, we drove back through Point Reyes and made a snack stop, and then headed back to my pad.

oyster

I made a quick salad with a balsamic vinaigrette plus some mignonette sauce, Megs washed my dishes to make room for shucking, and Lan and YJ got some more grub at Trader Joe's and Zachary's Pizza. After a lot of shucking and prep, we sat down to dinner: raw oysters on the half shell, Zachary's chicken pizza, a simple salad, plus soda and beer. It was a wonderful meal. What could be better than good food and good friends?

Labels: , , ,






Comments: Post a Comment
Powered by Blogger Get your own blog!

 Stay updated. Subscribe.

 Stay updated. Add this feed to My Yahoo!
When I learn a new word, I'll put it here so you can learn too!

EBITAS (noun):
Abbreviation for "Earnings Before Income Tax, Amortization, and SGARA." Next week, find out what SGARA is.

Click here for previous "new words."
For B-School Applicants
mba.com::GMAT signup
MBA Admissions Wire::Blogger details the application experience
BusinessWeek B-Schools::B-school profiles and more...
BW B-School Forums::chat with applicants, students, and alums (user registration required)
Más Kapital::cool new zine that looks at business in a new light

News Sites
BusinessWeek (BW)
CNN.com
Economist.com
Financial Times (FT)
Wall Street Journal (WSJ)

Rankings
BusinessWeek '02
Financial Times '03 (pdf)
U.S. News & World Report '04 (need to pay for premium to get detailed info)

School Links
Marshall School of Business at USC

For Procrastination
Bored at Work
Eric Conveys an Emotion::Funny site
Orisinal.com::Games (Flash required)

My Webpages
www.neenerweener.com::The Portal for all things neener
Relentless Fury::I rant about stuff
Art of Leisure::Stuff I like
This web site was made with...
Adobe Illustrator
::for making graphics
Adobe Photoshop
::for making graphics
Blogger
::a blogging tool
TextEdit
::for coding HTML
©www.neenerweener.com All rights reserved.