a random ass day.

our saturday began with a lovely dim sum at house of louie. now, it's not really "authentic" dim sum - it's far from the hundreds of cart ladies offering all sorts of stuff i don't recognize and are afraid of, out in alhambra/monterey park. but it's close to home, the siu mai and har gow are delish, and it's almost never crowded, so it works for us. of course, it was just the kid and me - the hub is far from a dim sum fan, and he stayed home with the bean and ate tamales instead. heh.

after we'd devoured every last bit, we said goodbye to my cousin r, who's going back home to nyc, and then the four of us hopped in the car and drove up to lake arrowhead. we hadn't been up there in ages, and the hub was hoping to score on a discounted coach briefcase at the outlet store in lake arrowhead's village shopping area.

and although we expected it, damn - it was frigid up in there. i'd bundled the bean up in her new baby gap sweater outfit, and i was glad i did, because what seemed like an overly warm ensemble ended up being exactly what she needed to keep warm. the hub managed to score his briefcase - a $500 item marked down to $260 - and i thought i'd found those elusive tall chocolate uggs. alas, they had only a size 9 and that's far too big for me. boo.

we walked through the whole village, stopped for caramel apples and hot chocolate (of course, i only had the latter - you know me), and then got back in the car and headed back down to rancho cucamonga's victoria gardens mall.

after driving by several restaurants and seeing the hordes of folks waiting for tables, we decided to head over to the ginormous, new bass pro shop and eat at the seafood restaurant there. i was surprised to hear that they HAD a restaurant, but the kid (who doesn't even like seafood) assured me that it was tasty. "they've got sweet tea, mom, and they sprinkle sugar on top of the bread and bake it till it melts a little and it's SOOOOO good."

even this restaurant had a two-hour (!) wait, but the hub managed to score a table in the bar area, which was first-come, first-served and offered the full menu. and i could see why people were attracted to this place - it was cheap as hell and the portions were pretty generous. i chose the shrimp pasta with lobster cream sauce and was really surprised to note that there was almost more shrimp than pasta! the kid was totally right about the bread. yummy.

and the bass pro shop was ridiculous - full of hunting, fishing, camping, etc. gear that just made me laugh. this top, in particular, gave me a case of the giggles that i couldn't shake for a while:
because, i mean, really? really?? oh man, i'm laughing all over again. hee hee!

but i did manage to find ONE redeeming quality about the place - they had every flavor of moon pie i'd ever heard of! i scooped up a vanilla, chocolate, banana, and orange. mmm, moon pies. marshmallowy goodness.

see? it's always, always about the food.

oh, and in answer to a couple of yesterday's comments - if you're ever in old town monrovia and pass by a joint called "devon"...don't. just don't. unless, of course, you WANT some blue cheese ice cream. i'm just sayin'.

happy new year, all! i'm not going to tell you what we're doing tonight till it's over. hopefully i don't get to butter knife status at any time during the evening. wish me luck.