Date Day

Happy Valentines Day!
So Andrew and I didn't do anything today because I had to babysit a little cutie but we did have an adventure yesterday!
I decided to drag Andrew to the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Old Town Alexandria (right on the waterfront). The Art Center is a cool place, it's three floors each filled to the brim with studios and even a school on the 2nd floor. I wasn't sure how big the school really was because it was at the far end of the 2nd floor and it didn't look like it occupied a lot of space.
On the website, it said there were 82 artist studios and even though we looked through a lot, its very surprising to know there were 82 studios filled with artist's works. Some of their pieces were expensive, like $1000+ but we did see some ceramic pieces for $20 or so. Each studio featured a different artists work (sometimes there were 3 artists to a studio, some had single artists residing it) and all doors were open to the public to observe each piece. I was a little intimidated by just walking into a room and the artist just sitting there doing whatever but each room did have huge windows so whenever I felt nervous, I just walked past it and observed from the outside.
The first room Andrew and I went into was a 'Valentine Gallery'. There were little 8x10 pieces made by artists in the Art Center, each having to do with love.
What made the room cooler though was this little piece.

What I wrote about Andrew. I couldn't think of something cool to write.

Andrews love note to me. <3

How cool huh? I had fun with this and I'm sure lots of other people did too. 

After that we just browsed a lot of studios. Of course Andrew and I weren't going to buy anything but it was really nice just looking at different people's works. 

After looking through the first floor, we went outside because Andrew saw a sign that said arcade. We didn't see an arcade but we did see a frozen yogurt shop.

It was like other frozen yogurt shops. Self-serve, had like 6 or 8 different yogurt tastes. Not that many toppings like Yogi Berry but decent amount. They had lechee which I liked because I almost never see it. The only problem I had was that it was 49 cents per ounce. I had went to another frozen yogurt shop in Alexandria and it was 32 or 39 cents per ounce so it was kind of disappointing on my wallet. The owner is really nice though so the service there would make me visit the shop again.

Cute fishies :)

A lot of people had signs up like 'No pictures please!' so I didn't take pics of the artists work.

The view outside. Some rooms faced the waterfront so all those people occupying it had a nice view!!!

When we were on our way out, we found a giant chalk wall. There was pieces of chalk on both sides of the piece so of course, I grabbed some and decided to draw.

I thought the ceiling looked really cool so I took a pic :)

After the Art Center, Andrew and I decided to grab some lunch because he got really hungry. I wasn't too hungry but I was cold so I got the udon noodles in miso soup. It was a lot better than I expected it to be, I kind of thought it was going to be bland but there was enough flavor in it. I did add hot sauce in it so maybe that helped. Andrew got the spicy tuna rolls with nigiri. Yum yum!!!!!
All in all, it was a fun day with my significant other.

Game Art

Some pieces I did for fun.

My first piece so that's why it looks a little rough.

Made this one for my cousin and her wife. They liked it.. so they say!!! lol.

I have a couple of more, including the 'love me...' Pac Man one above. I am going to work on a space invaders one soon. Hopefully it turns out well.

New York Trip

I scored some free tickets on megabus.com, this was a very limited promotion way back, so Andrew and I went to New York on  Jan 24th! We had to be at Union Station by 6 AM in order to get to New York by 11. For those who haven't used bus travel from Union Station, all you have to do is walk through the building, go up one floor and then just head out into the parking garage. There should be some signs guiding you where to go as well.
The bus wasn't bad at all. It was a double-decker bus with free wi-fi, plug-in outlets, bathroom and reclining seats. There were also windows on the ceiling on the 2nd level of the bus which looked very nice. One of the coolest things about the bus is that on the first level, there are two tables up at front and four seats around it. So a group of four could play cards together, chill out and be super comfortable. I'm not sure if all megabus' have that though.

No one else in line!

Not the best picture but hopefully you get the idea.

There was just about 10 - 15 other people from DC taking the bus in the morning and Andrew and I were 3rd in line so we got a head start on where to sit. He wanted to sit up top and in the back -_- Oh and I'm not sure if it was because our bus ride wasn't too long (5 - 6 hours) but we didn't have any stops except to pick up some more people from Baltimore.
So we got to New York around 11. Andrew and I were pretty hungry so we headed to this place I found online called Food Gallery 32 in Korea Town.

Food Gallery 32 is like a mini food court. It's so clean and so cute that I wish I took more pics to show you all!! It was three levels; one level had all the food, a mini frozen yogurt stall, and a couple of tables. The second level had another mini store where you sign up for a cellphone contract. I think it might have to do with international calling but I wasn't sure. The second level also had more tables to eat. Then the third level had even more tables to sit and eat and I think a crepe making station? I read that online but I didn't really look at it because I felt awkward under the workers stares. Plus it wasn't open so I couldn't really tell from a glance.

I love it.

Anyways, there was probably only nine stalls to get food from. A lot of the workers were Korean but some sold pho, japanese food, or chinese food. A lot of noodles were on the menu though, I noticed. Andrew got the bibimbap and I got seafood pho. Our meals were both about $10 but worth it. We had to wait for our food to be ready so we got one of those buzzer things that go off when it is.

The drink on the right was delicious. The left was okay.

My pho was pretty good, everything on my tray was included in it which was very cool. I wish I was given more hoisen sauce to add more flavor but it still wasn't bad for the price. I like how I got kimchi with my pho, Andrew said my kimchi was better than his. Also both foods were wrapped in saran wrap which was different for me but it did help me not spill my soup when I walked up the stairs.

After our lunch we went to a bunch of different stores. These stores were around Broadway St downtown, soho area.

Pearl River Mart - Huge Asian store that sold a bunch of Chinese items. They had outfits, stationary, books, food, paper lanterns, dishes, and other bunch of other stuff you'd expect to see if you've already been in an Asian supermarket. There was this book there however, a sort of writing journal and on each page had a different scenario that asked you questions like, 'you are at a cafe and a man approaches you... do you know him? what do you say to him?' So it was like a journal that would try to help you get ideas if you were to write a story. I forgot the name and I really wish I got it!!!!!

Uniqlo - it just seemed like a more expensive H&M. I think it's clothing from Japan as well.

Also, for those with kids, if you come out of Uniqlo, make a right coming out, and walk up a bit then you will see the Scholastic book store!!! It was across the street but it is clearly visible. I totally wanted to go in and find Arthur books (because they are impossible to find anywhere else) but since it was across the street, it was a little discouraging. I was on a schedule, hehe.

Supreme - Small store. It was shaped like a box and I was kind of disappointed that they barely had anything up. I wanted to get something back from here the most but ended up with nothing.

WesC - near the Supreme store. Much more of a selection. Everything in the store was 50% off as well!!! Didn't get anything though :(

Flight Club - I didn't care for this store!!! Andrew really wanted to visit this store and we almost walked past it because there was no sign.. if you looked inside then you would know it was flight club because of all the shoes on the wall. It was all on one side of the wall and it was an pretty long wall too. There were some rare shoes on display but they were behind glass. Some shoes cost up to $5000! Ridiculous!!!

After all the stores there, we went up north near Times Square. The first store we went to was the Nintendo World store! The last time I went here in the summer, I grabbed a ton of stuff. They have little mini pokemon plushies there for $10 and the last time I was there, I picked up four plushies. This time I got none because I had no idea who any of the pokemon were. I think they were from the Black/White season and I've never played the game or watched the episodes so I wasn't in love.

The Nintendo store looked just about the same as it did six months ago when I was there. A bunch of the same stuff too so that's probably also why I didn't buy anything.

There were more displays like the picture above with more Legend of Zelda stuff but there was also this worker hanging around so I felt very uncomfortable trying to sneak taking pictures. >_<

When we left the Nintendo store, we walked a few blocks down and into a store called Book-Off. Book-Off is a cool store that sells mainly books, movies, CDs and video games. There were even some systems on sale! We saw an NES for $20! I'm not sure if they test their systems before selling it but I would've totally bought it if I wasn't taking the bus back home. They even have games from Japan so if you're the lucky one who understands it then I'm sure you'd have more use with those games than me. :( Each different section would have dollar deals. All the DVDs were $7 that day, they had some CDs on sale for $2, and books and manga had its own $1 sale section!!!! It was glorious!!! I didn't check the regular prices of other stuff, I just hung around all the sale sections, haha. The lower floor had all the manga and there was a lot more manga in Japanese than in English but there was still a good amount of manga in English. Book-Off is a store I'd definitely check out if you're into manga and video games.

Then we walked down a few more blocks and went into Kinokuniya. This is a store I'm always excited to go into. It's right across Bryant Park and next to two shoe/urban clothes stores. Kinokuniya is a cool store with a bunch of items from Japan. 

There are three floors. Basement floor had a bunch of stationary and I think reference books? I never venture far off from the stationary so I haven't fully explored the whole area in the basement. The first main floor has a bunch of books, some tokidoki or domo apparel. A papercrafting book section and mini little cute randoms. The third floor had more books, DVDs from some anime and some Asian movies. There's also a little cafe on the right side as soon as you enter. They sold some drinks from Asia, regular drinks like coke, tea, pastries, sushi and some sandwiches. It was pretty hot up there so the chocolate from my pastry melted onto my fingers. 

Green tea pastries

It was actually yummier than it looks. I wish I bought two.

I didn't buy anything for myself here. I bought my friend some cute stationary though. :)

When we were done with that store, we headed to the Times Square area and the first stop was the Sanrio store!!

But I didn't get anything here either. -_- It was kind of like the Nintendo store, I came here six months ago and everything seemed kind of the same. They had some new collections on sale but I wasn't really into them so I walked away with nothing which I'm sure made Andrew happy. 

A store I really wanted to go to was the Disney store and the Toys R Us. Didn't go to the Disney store but definitely stopped by the Toys R Us. It was probably the biggest toy store I've ever been into. It had three floors and a ferris wheel (tickets for ferris wheel are $4.50 per person btw). There were two different candy sections in different places, one was Candy Land and the other had all Willy Wonka candy. There wasn't much shocks or surprises at the store. They did still sell some Powerpuff Girl stuff which I thought was cool. 

The purple thing on the left is where they had Willy Wonka candy.

Barbie's House filled with so many damn Barbies. I expected pink furniture or a Barbie-esque home decor but Toys R Us didn't come through.

It was around 4:45 - 5 PM when we left the store. We decided to head to place where we were supposed to meet up for our bus departure. We were also getting hungry so we decided to find out where the bus stop was and then eat around there. 

The place closest was Cloud 9 Diner. Andrew got a cheeseburger and I got a veggie burger. My veggie burger was not great, it kept falling apart and I was almost tempted to just mix it together and eat it by itself without the bun. It was a nice and cute diner though.

Good size burger though.

Finally, it was time to leave. New York was fun and I was glad I got to go with Andrew. I only spent $40 on things and $20 on food! Then probably like $10 - $15 on cab fares. I'm definitely going to go back but this time, I think I'm going to spend a night there so I won't have to feel too rushed doing everything.

Here's some eye candy now!