I think last year I wrote a blog called “the weirdest birthday.”  This year my birthday wasn’t weird.  Although maybe I shouldn’t make that judgement call just yet since it won’t happen for another two days.  This year I have a lot to be thankful for.  My parents sent me a gift that I not only wanted but needed. 

On Saturday Sam took me to Mastro’s.  Mastro’s is one of those Beverly Hills swank restaurants where you can’t get an entree under $40, and many items say “MKT.”  It is supposed to be on the same level as Pacific Dining Car, where we went for Sam’s birthday last year.  However, I think Mastro’s is several times better than PDC.  The staff is more attentive, the atmosphere is more upscale (PDC is somewhat frumpy and antique) and the steaks are better.  Sam got the 22oz ribeye and I tried the Alaskan King Crab legs.  Both were great.  At the end they brought this big slice of chocolate cake that looked delicious, until we found out it had hazelnuts in it.  Since I couldn’t eat it they boxed the cake for Sam and made us creme brulee.  I think the brulee is more expensive than the cake because they made a big deal about how “lucky” I was to get it.  Make no mistake though – it was delicious, and they didn’t charge us for either one.  If you’ve got the money and feel like good seafood or steak I recommend it.  A few of our neighbors tried some of the appetizers and other specials and they looked great too.  We didn’t have any of the “extras” though because our main course (after eating the nice bread selection) ended up being too filling anyway.  I would have liked to have seen what the “mountain of onion rings” looked like though…

I look weird in this picture.  Look at my eyes, one is more open than the other and one looks lazy.  Do I have a lazy eye?!  What is going on?  Don’t look at me – look at that brulee…..  Better yet, look at my hot date for the evening below…

That night we went to Urth Cafe for some sketching and then watched The Informant.  We both found it way better than Up in the Air and didn’t understand why everyone made such a fuss about the Clooney bore and ignored this movie.  Of course, we might have been more interested in Mark Whitacre because we watched the real life “Hawaii Tapes” in our Economics class last year when we talked about price fixing.

Sunday we went to Ord Noodles in Thai Town for lunch. Afterwards we  went to Luz De La Jesus gallery down the street to see their “big show.”  There were some good pieces, specifically JAW Cooper’s and Nathan Ota’s stuff, but by and large we agreed that the High Fructose show at Copro last week was way better.  Much of the show at Jesus seemed to be focused on the “suicide girls” (warning, NSFW!) aesthetic, which I’m not into.

We had originally planned to go to Runyon Canyon after the gallery – but we realized that eating the noodle soup before hiking was a bad idea because the soup is full of sodium and not many nutrients.  So we went to Robek’s for a “chocolate dipped strawberry shake,” which is actually pretty good.   Since we were closer to Griffith Park we went up the Los Feliz entrance and hiked from there.  Where we ended up after about an hour was the same spot I used to hike to from the Burbank side when I lived over there three years ago.  At the top of the hill there is a big slab of blacktop (although it’s covered with some kind of pink sealant now) where you can see both the valley and LA proper at the same time.

This guy was enjoying the view too…that blurry blue stuff is the ocean, it was clear enough to see from Griffith Park today.