Yummmmm-O!!!

Howdy....

I think I'm channeling my inner cowgirl here for some reason, cause it appears howdy is the greeting of the day....or Salemat Pagi or Salemat Siang or Salemat Malam. But you guys don't know those.....hehehe so it's howdy for the English speakers, lol.

Anyway, E & I just had a fabulous steak for lunch, and I am quite impressed with myself, that I could possibly make such a delicious thing......so let me start from the beginning:

Yesterday was E & I's "date day." Of course, what else is there to do other than go into Surabaya!! So we woke up at normal time (for E it's 6:35, for C it's 7:15) and waited for the driver and car to take us into Surabaya. There was mild traffic on our way in, and we had to make 2 errands before we had our time, and I was hungry by this point, cause I had already been up for 4 hrs and not a drop of food, so we stopped by McDonald's. A open 24-hrs, delivery available 24-hrs, McD's in the middle of Surabaya. We got a Double burger combo #5 with no onion and a coca-cola to drink. Now, it tasted exactly the same!!!!!!! Smelled the same too. Even inside the McD's was the same!! We did drive thru, but still I snooped around inside from the car...does that make sense? (I know my English is getting a little rough....like earlier I couldn't even think of the word for Exclamation Point ->!!<-) Ok point being, it was good, E and I split it, and it was enough to hold us over til lunch. After our quick bite, our first stop was Hi-Tech Mall, where we exchanged the headphones that we use to talk on Skype, for a different pair, and it was quite simple and easy. Then we hopped back into the car and headed over to our favorite place.....none other than Mal Galaxy!! When we got there we made a quick pee stop and decided to walk around and see what we wanted to do. We ended up getting these flavored potatoes up on the 2nd floor...you can chooses chili and cheese, spicy bbq, I can't remember this flavor, regular bbq and original. Which one do you think we chose? Spicy BBQ of course!! They were delicious, and E had been telling me about them since before he came back to Indonesia...so it was quite nice to see what he's been raving all these times. We also got a bottled water for me, and Pure Sugar Cane drink for E. (I tasted it.....and it's.....something I wouldn't ever desire to try again.....)

After our 2nd snack of the day (we sound like little piggies...but it's really not like that.....) we decided to dual it out once again in AIR HOCKEY!! We love this game. Or at least I do. E seems like he throughly enjoys it as well. We went into TimeZone (that's the name of the Arcade) and played a Zombie killing game, a few of those, then some other game. Then we went to the Air Hockey table.....we decided to play the best of 3.....so Game 1 winner is: CARLE (7-5)!!! Game 2 winner is: ERI(7-6)!! So all tied up.....and Game 3.....w...i...n...n...e...r...is: ERI (7-4)!!! Eri won, of course. Eri ALWAYS wins!! But we had a great time playing the Air Hockey. It was awesome. By that time, we were all worn out from Air Hockey, we decided to eat lunch. (It took a long time to play...since we are both so good ;-) ) We decided to have lunch at Wok. (No sadly enough, not Duck King....but I know they recognized me, and expected us to come in...but we didn't.) Wok is a good place to eat, Eri had something with dry hard noodles and pork, and I had Fried Rice Finny. Whatever that is...it was red fried rice with some kind of sauce in it, it was good. Then we went to the 2 toys stores in the mall, and looked at all the cool stuff. Then to BreadTalk to buy...what? BREAD!! And then to J. Co Donuts to buy Tiramisu donuts...and an iced coffee beverage...or if you're E, you buy Thai tea, which isn't that bad tasting...only if I liked tea more ;-) By this time it's 215pm and we have to leave at 245pm, so we are sitting inside J.Co deciding what for dinner....ohhhhh wait......I forgot something....before BreadTalk, we went grocery shopping at 99 Ranch and bought groceries....DUH..... :-) ok, so we decided to order a pizza from Pizza Hut and take it home for dinner, so when we got back, we could just relax for the evening......so we ordered it, waited for it, (and I finally have mastered the art of using the bathroom in Indonesia, thank you thank you!) and got it, and headed home. (Which after eating the Pizza, I think I told E, remember how we said we weren't going to eat at Pizza Hut anymore? Yeah...I think we must of forgotten that when we decided to order the pizza.....when we started eating it, that memory quickly came back....lol. The pizza we tried this time was wayyyyyyyyy better than the pizza we had last time, yes, but still wasn't delicious. Sorry Pizza Hut. I will be looking forward to your thin crusted pepperoni -self when I come back home, until then, no more Pizza for me...for sure!!)

Ok, about the steaks, we bought 2 Australian cattle steaks from 99 Ranch.....and we decided to eat them today for lunch. So we started marinating them last night. We cut off all the fats and soaked them overnight in this:
4 cloves of garlic
Worcestershire Sauce
A1 Supreme Garlic Steak Sauce (I'm not sure if they sell this in US or not.....)
All Purpose Seasoning
Cajun Spices
Rosemary
Pepper

And oh my god....it is like perhaps the best steak we have ever eaten!! We had it with grilled corn (wrapped up in small amount of butter and more garlic) and fresh grilled Squash and Zucchini mixture....it was soooooooooooooo good. You guys should try it!! And the best part about it, there was no oil!! Everything, literally everything here is deep fried in oil, so it's really good to have a meal with no oil!!!

Here's the picture of the Shark/Alligator statue I was too lazy to get last time.....
Oh, and here's the story about Surabaya, taken from Wikipedia....in case you don't remember the whole shark/alligator background info....like why it's there (and I really took these pics, by the way):

"Surabaya is commonly said to derive its name from the wordssura or suro (shark) and baya or boyo (crocodile), two creatures which, in a local myth, fought each other in order to gain the title of "the strongest and most powerful animal" in the area according to a Jayabaya prophecy. This prophecy tells of a fight between a giant white shark and a giant white crocodile. Now the two animals are used as the city's logo, the two facing each other while circling the city's monument, the Heroes Monument. This folk etymology, though embraced enthusiastically by city leaders, is somewhat dubious. Alternate derivations proliferate: e.g. from the Javanese sura ing baya, meaning "bravely facing danger". Some people consider this Jayabaya prophecy as a great war between Surabaya native people and invaders in 1945, while another story is about two heroes that fought each other in order to be the king of the city. The two heroes were Sura and Baya."

And here's a picture of us from last week....right after we took the pics of the Shark and Alligator:


Oh and yes, today is Thanksgiving...so Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!! It's like the first time I've never been to Nanny's (Memaw to some....) for Thanksgiving in a long long long time....but no worriesNanny, I'll be back soon........and gosh how I miss that chicken casserole, and the corn, and the ham, and deviled eggs, baked beans, mac & cheese, ummmm all that stuff!!! Ok, enough day dreaming about Thanksgiving feasts....lol. And since it's Thanksgiving, I guess I need to share what I am thankful for, right? Well, let me think, it's like so obvious, BUT here I go:

I am thankful for being able to have the time to come to Indonesia and spend some months with Eri. Thank you Mom & Dad. Thank you Bobby for taking care of the house, my kitty, and my dog. I could never express my gratitude enough....and thank you for the support. Thank you for listening and understanding my want to go to Indonesia. I've never lost a parent, but I'm glad I was able to be here to help comfort Eri along the way with all his en devours. And my desire to get married abroad.....lol. (Wait til ya'll see the video, the wedding was amazing!) I am thankful for Eri....for being an absolute amazing host, making the transition for me smooth as possible. I'm thankful for being able to get married, to literally my best friend, (which that brings on a whole other topic, of which, before we even started dating, Eri was indeed my best friend, so I really got to marry my best friend.) At this moment, I am thankful for everyone and everything. Honestly. Thank you for your passion, your loyalty, your support. I love every single one of you.

Okies, that's it for now. Love ya.

Mrs. W