howeird: (anything)
howard stateman ([personal profile] howeird) wrote2005-09-03 02:53 pm

Dinner and a Movie

Just a quick note because I'm late for lunch & a swim. Had a fun, laughter-filled, delightful dinner last night with [livejournal.com profile] farmount and [livejournal.com profile] nevynn at the Green Papaya in Los Gatos. It is billed as a Vietnamese restaurant, but there were few dishes on the menu which sounded remotely like Vietnamese food, and those which did turned out to be so Californicated as to be unrecognizable as any particular cuisine, let alone Asian.

Having said that, the food was okay, and not as over-priced as I'd expected.

The highlight of the food portion of the meal was undoubtedly [livejournal.com profile] farmount's Banana Flambé. She told the waitress "It was awful, can you bring me another?" I told the waitress "she was devastated when her banana went out".

We were there for about 2 1/2 hours, having lots of fun, laughing loudly and no doubt annoying whomever was sitting on either side of us. Afterwards I went down the block to see what Los Gatos looked like these days, and was just in time for the 9:30 showing of March of the Penguins, so I bought a ticket and saw the film.

You have to see it. And you have to keep fixed in your mind throughout the whole film that real live human photographers filmed the whole thing as it happened. Nine months in -58º temps, blizzards, and all that that entails. Emperor penguins are such amazingly gorgeous creatures, especially when they find True Love.