racial

I saw this in the Asian supermarket while I was shopping and it kind of put me off ... for the uninitiated the word "gook" is a derogatory racial slur for Asians used in the Vietnam War and here it is, in some kind of Japanese cracker snack! Unbelievable!

And I'm also not sure how it is characterized as Salad, seeing as it looks a lot like Pocky which is cracker stick coated with chocolate. Maybe the orange flavor makes it a salad??? Anyways, that's messed up, man.

flavors

As I have professed in the past, I am a lover of chicken wings, and certainly am willing to go out of my way to find a good chicken wing. They actually opened up a Hooters near my house, but no I haven't been over there yet. However I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there are several Wingstop restaurants in the Fremont area -- another option for wings, and not just buffalo-style wings either. If you're not into the bright orange wings they offer various wing flavors such as hickory smoked BBQ, teriyaki, lemon-pepper.

If you go to the website, football Hall-of-Famer Troy Aikman proudly proclaims, "they're the best wings I've ever tasted!" Well I'm not sure I agree with Troy who may have been tackled a few too many times to have any credible sense of taste left. I kind of think he must have part ownership of the chain or something? Anyways the wings are good, but not the best I've had. I recommend the Original Hot and the Garlic Parmesan flavors, but their seasoned french fries are also very good. They're a lot closer to me than University Chicken but UC has bigger wings and tastier sauce. That's too bad because WS is on my way home from work and I can see myself going there a lot more often. To add to the convenience they even accept online orders at the once closest to me, and I can place my order at work with a few clicks and pick it up on the way home! Pretty cool. And when you sign up for the online account they sent me a coupon for a free order of fries for the next order, very nice.

In summary I don't think Wingstop provides as memorable a dining experience as a place like University Chicken or House of Chicken and Waffles, but as a convenient place to stop and get some wings when you've got that hankering, it's a good choice.

Also really quick I went and checked out another local burger joint, Mission Burger near Ohlone College. Very good charbroiled burger, a little better than Bob's Burgers and nearly as close to my place. I think I'm going to start hitting them up more often when I feel like a burger.

rehabilitation

I've had a week off from work and plenty of time to think about updating this blog, but of course I've been lazy and decided to spend that time doing other things, like recovering from the madness of trial, eating and playing video games. Spending a lot of time in virtual Miami as Tony Montana in Scarface: The World Is Yours. It's bloody, violent, chock-full of vulgarity, and it's great fun. What other game lets you zoom in and target the left or right testicle of your target before you blast him with your rifle? "Say hello to my lil' friend!"

Also spent time catching up on all the television I missed while I was away at trial. Watched recorded episodes of The Apprentice, Lost, and American Idol. Caught a few Formula 1 races as well. Young F1 rookie Lewis Hamilton is really making a name for himself, finishing in the top 3 in every race he's run so far -- setting a new record in Formula 1 racing. Poor Robert Kubica at BMW, who was a rookie last year and my pick as one to watch this season, has been overshadowed by this young British talent who is racing alongside reigning champion Fernando Alonso at McLaren and wowing everyone with his skill.

I decided as my gift to myself after the trial I would get a new exhaust for my Lexus IS350 -- after having performance exhausts on my other two cars the Lexus was really too quiet for me. I decided on the Tanabe Touring Medallion dual exhaust after hearing it in person on another car -- gives it a nice deep tone and growl without being too loud and obnoxious. It also saves some weight and adds some power over the stock exhaust system so I have some performance benefits as well.

I was going to record some video clips of the new and improved sound, but through the power of the internet, conveniently here is a video someone recorded of the exact same car with the exact same exhaust -- it's even the same color so this looks just like my car. Good stuff.

So now I'm back at work, back in the office -- and suddenly I have time to update my blog. Funny how things work out huh? Happy Friday.

crepuscular

It's finally over. But not really. After 3 long weeks of sleepless nights and a tense 8 days in court fueled primarily by coffee and Amp, the work is done and the jury rendered a verdict. To our surprise the jury ruled in plaintiff's favor -- suprising because we felt we had outgunned them in every way. But where we kind of won the battle was in damages -- instead of the $75 million the plaintiff was seeking, the jury awarded them only $6.5 million. The client was happy about that, considering they had a potential exposure of much more, but in the end as lawyers I think we have to consider this a loss. The real kicker is, there's another related litigation coming up in June, this time at the ITC in DC. Most likely I will be involved.

Cisco owes $6.5M

After the initial repeat visits to the Ale House, our opportunities to go out and enjoy a good meal dwindled to virtually nil as we worked day and night, but at least the catering we had brought in was not too bad at all. On the occasional night of "suboptimal" dining experience, there was always the late-night pizza call. Grotto's pizza was the midnight savior for us in our time of need.
My team and I are fairly bitter about the loss. Perhaps we were cocky enough to assume victory when it was not assured, but we really thought we were going to win this one. It was like repeated slaps to the face as the clerk read the jury's verdict. Infringement. Slap! Willful infringement. Slappity slap! Invalidity defenses denied. Boot to the head! Equitable defenses denied. Kick in the ass!

We went out to dinner with the client afterwards and although the mood was somewhat dejected, the client was still very appreciative. We sampled various tastes and treats at 821, an upscale downtown restaurant with a French-style tasting menu. The spinach and gnocchi salad was fantastic, and so was the lamb plate and the braised rib. My butt was sore after sitting and eating and drinking for over 3 hours however... it felt like I had just gone through a 5 hour flight in a cramped economy seat.

So today we finished packing up the warroom and sending off the truck with all our documents and supplies back to California. The bigwigs flew the coop almost immediately after verdict and left us holding the bags as usual. Tonight, our last night in Wilmington, I decided to take the team still in town out for a real treat, by taking a car to Philly and having dinner at the Saloon, an upscale Italian-American steakhouse. I know this place from going there about 2 years ago when I was last in Philly on business. The food there is fantastic and so was the waitress. She handed us a two-page menu and then rattled off specials of the day for a good 5 minutes. There were probably more items on the specials than the menu. You really have to pay attention as she talks about them, because they are truly the better choices and there's so much to choose from. I don't know why they don't just print out the daily menu instead but it does give an entertaining experience. Repeating my experience of 2 years ago, I ordered a Blue Hawaii only to be told that they didn't have Blue Curacao, and as a substitute was given a pink drink. My coworkers loved it and were promptly stunned when I ordered and devoured an entire porterhouse steak plus dessert, a sumptuous banana custard tart. Good stuff. But I think we all dozed off on the ride back from Philly to the hotel.

Tomorrow morning we rise at 5:30am and head to the airport for the trip home. It's been a long time coming, and all of us can't wait to get back. I haven't seen my honey V for nearly a month, and it's going to be good to be home.

installation

Greetings from Wilmington, Delaware. I flew into Philadelphia 7 days ago. Unfortunately I did not have time to stop in Philly for a cheesesteak, but that is still a goal of mine. I caught a cab from the airport straight to my hotel in Wilmington. The Hotel DuPont is probably the nicest hotel in Wilmington, and it's in the heart of the downtown area. Unfortunately there's not much else around, it is mostly office buildings and at night and weekends the place is totally dead. Working until about 1-2AM each night, walking the block and a half back to the hotel is eerily quiet and uneventful. I had expected it to be colder, but it has actually warmed up nicely since I arrived. Temps are in the 60s and even got into the 80s for a day or two. But now it is raining again.

I gotta talk about the food situation here. The first few nights we went to this place within walking distance from the hotel, and it was great. So good we kept coming back -- it's probably the best bar and grill type place in the area. It's called Washington St. Ale House, and they have some good grub. I recommend the Build Your Own Burger, their buffalo wings, and the crab cakes. My coworkers introduced me to a new beer, called Yuengling Ale. Mmmm good stuff. We also tried a fancy seafood restaurant called Deep Blue that's right across the street from the hotel. Very niiice. But once the whole team arrived it was time to get to work. We set up our warroom on the 16th floor of our local counsel's building, which is the Chase building. Home away from home. My hotel room is just where I sleep. All of our meals are being catered by a company called Movable Feasts, and it's actually pretty darn good. They keep the variety going and we've had everything from salads to steak to crab cakes.

But the real show stopper is the trial snack setup that we have here just outside our warroom -- a complete table covered with snacks and candy. Believe it or not, this is pretty much what we have at every trial we do. Some of my coworkers are super health conscious but this kind of spread is hard to resist. Mmmm gummi worms. You know what, when you work 16 hour days every day of the week for this long, you gotta spoil yourself a little bit.

The view outside our office is fairly bland, but we do get to watch the sunset each evening when the weather is clear and take in the beauty of it all for a brief moment before we turn back to our work. Tomorrow we begin jury selection and on Monday the trial begins. It's going to be a long weekend I know, a lot of work between now and verdict. That's it for now, stay tuned for another update when I can. Most nights I just walk back to my room and fall into bed almost immediately.