Tony "da Tigarrrr!!" ..'s Profile

This is for their website only.  

Terrible. Probably the most inept website evaaar!!  Extremely slow, cumbersome, and not user friendly at all.  You would think that a utility company servicing an area this size would have their act together with a dynamic website.  But EBMUD's website reminds me of webportals from when the internet first came out.  To pay your bills online, you have to sign up to use a third party entity. Say whaaaaa? Login in takes at least 15-30 seconds for it to respond.  Don't even think about actually taking a look at your bill. The system will simply time out and tell you to come back later.  Lame.

Not all parts of Oakland are terrible.  I've been mugged only once (at a bus stop by some teenagers at gun point), gotten my car windows broken only once (***2011 Update, it's twice now***) , and had my house robbed only twice in the many years I've lived here. The trick is to have your butterfly knife un-hinged and ready to be flipped out for action at a moment's notice. I couldn't live anywhere else.  Walnut Creek? pfff... boring.  San Francisco? pfff...who the hell wants to spend 70% of your paycheck on housing.  I personally can't sleep at night without the calming sound of bullets keeping the streets clear of vagrants.  

Of course we have our problems. We all know what they are. But if you are able to growup in Oakland and be a responsible member of society, as the majority of Oakland-ers are, you probably could make it anywhere.  Oakland will teach you to live with diversity and adversity. People don't have to be pretentious or pretend to be something they are not.  And it's always good to test your courage.

But all deals are off if I win the lottery!! Now who wants to knife-fight me?

I think this is the first time I've had Afghan food. I ordered the ground beef kabob to go. Or was that Persian? Anyway, it was nicely herbed and came with a side of a cilantro-like sauce. I dunked pieces of the meat into it.  It was slightly sweet, sour, tangy, grassy and herby.  It came with really good long grain rice.  I was shoveling heaps of it into my mouth. I think the rice had a butter coating and spices on it or something. I don't know, but it was good. I'm Chinese and I eat rice almost every day. The side salad was simple but crisp and fresh and came with flatbread. The people are super friendly and I think they said it was a family restaurant. There are other Afghan dishes I'd like to try but I don't remember what they're called. Although they also serve pasta and burgers, I wished they had more Afghan and eastern dishes on their menu.

I know nothing about filipino food except lumpia.  But I know when things aren't jiving. If you had awkward customer service but served decent food, you might still get me to come back. Unfortunately, this tiny restaurant has awkward service with subpar food. The menu was limited. I think there was a roasted pork dish, fried shrimp cakes, and chicken and pork stew dishes. I got the stewed pork dish, fried shrimp cake, and rice. It was OK but nothing spectacular. The fellow who put it together was nice. But after finishing my plate, I decided to clean up after myself and brought the tray back to the counter. I said thanks to the lady behind the register only to be quietly stared at.  You know, you should be courteous to all your customers. Say "thanks for coming" or something to your customers.  Will never come back again.

Just an OK. If they had better service/attitude, I might have given them four stars.

The only think I get here is that "Healthy Four" dessert that comes with those colorful round things, aloe, barley seeds, and that coral jelly. That stuff is good although kinda pricy for what you get.  What I don't like is the awkward attitude I get when I ask them to not add any additional sweetener.  The jellies are sweet enough for me and every time I ask them not to add any extra sweetener/syrup, they act as if it's some great travesty.

I really struggled with this place.  It's one of those instances when I wish Yelp had separate ratings for criteria.  I'd give food four stars, price two stars, and ambiance/bling-bling, five stars.  My trusty calculator-wrist watch says that's an average of 4 stars!!  Shut up. I love my watch.

I rarely get to dine at posh places but I passed by on a weekday and decided to try lunch.  The restaurant was smaller than I imagined but was really nice and well laid out. I sat at the sushi bar which overlooks a sunken kitchen. The waiter and the sushi chef were really nice and professional.  Nothing really stood out from the menu EXCEPT THE PRICES!! Woooooo. Even my calculator-wrist watch took a hard gulp. Shut up. I'm cool I tell you.  Anyway, I ordered the $22 chirashi which is mixed sashimi over rice.  Although the portions were small, it was good and nicely presented. The fish tasted fresh but not super special. I liked that the rice was clearly vinegared, most places don't even bother doing this.  I still don't think the chirashi itself was worth that much. If you throw in the ambiance and the attentive service, maybe a little bit.

I must have sat on a four leaf clover earlier that day because I lucked out. Reading about the long wait and Hideki's wife yelling at people, I expected a daunting experience. I've never been here and just happened to pass by.  Lo-and-behold there was no line and there were two empty seats. Good thing Hideki's stern wife was guarding the entrance, otherwise I would have broken one of their rules and just barged in and sat myself down.  She quickly cleaned it up and invited me in. My first actual mistake was opening those damn soy sauce bottles which virtually invite people to play with them. I was lucky that she wasn't looking or she would have thrashed me.

Once I got passed that gauntlet of a woman, it was smooth sailing. Hideki's nigiri is definitely one of the best I've ever had. Fresh and clean tasting.  Scallops, tuna, anago, butterfish, etc. were all awesome!! The fish that needed to be firm had great bite and those that needed to be smooth, melted in your mouth. The butterfish and tuna were so good! I can't explain the super quality of the fish. You just have to eat here to understand.

The entire restaurant is just an eight seat sushi bar. It' so small it can be awkwardly quiet. But quietness forces you to watch Hideki masterfully make your nigiri. Then you will realize that it's truly an art when done right.  He's so knowledgeable and once you break the ice, he's quite friendly. He was giving away bits and pieces to everyone. He gave me a few chunks of toro!!

The secret to getting seats is going during times of great calamity. Remember when we were in the bowels of the Great Recession and nobody wanted to go out and spend money? That's when I went.  Easy seating. Remember when nobody wanted to venture out when it was raining shat-loads of water with 50 knot winds and peeking out your window felt like you're looking out the port window of a Carnival cruiseship? That's when you should have gone. Easy seating.

Damn, I just wanted to pick up the cauldren of boiling soup and drink it.  It's that good. The soup with all those herbs, spices, and what must be fifty garlic cloves gives the meat really good flavor. Althought I would leave out the cardomon. I'm not too fond of that.  Last time I went, we had the hot/mild pot.  Kinda pricey compared to an all you can eat hot pot place, but the herbal soup flavors makes it worth it once in a while. Service is kinda rushed but what do ya expect when there's a bus load of people waiting.

Well today, I saw puppies being sold from a cooler!! Man, that was sooooooo cute. Upping this one more star!~

In the four years that I have yelped, I have never given out a 1 star rating.  I wanted to reserve that one star for something that really deserved it. And I think I found it today.

This morning's "Automated Suicide Prevention Hotline" skit was not funny at all.  It's not that I find it a sick subject. The skit itself just wasn't even funny. The jokes were terrible and it was a convoluted boring piece.  They tried but it was soooooooooo lame. I was actually embarrassed for them. And what exactly is this music mix? It's a mishmash of everything.