Day 5

Yesterday was a good work day.  In the morning I reread an important article, very slowly and carefully, then I went through all of the references I needed so I could look them up later.  Then, I worked on my outline (this is all for question 2).  During lunch I laid in the sun and read a magazine for a break (Dan thinks it’s weird to eat lunch in my bathing suit, but I don’t).  In the afternoon, I reread the first half of a very important book that I will be using in question 2.  I’ll spend the weekend finishing that off for good measure (I read another chapter this morning already).

To celebrate the end of my first week and the completion of my first question, Dan and I went out to eat at an all vegetarian south Indian restaurant called Banana Leaf.  This was a completely different type of Indian.  I had only ever heard of three dishes on the menu.  They had a neat buffet where they served you a series of chaats (street food) made fresh as appetizers, along with mango lassi, and then you ate from the actual buffet for dinner.  They also served hot fluffy fried bread with that.  But, Dan and I weren’t sure we wanted to pig out, buffet-style, so we tried to order two separate meals with samosas as appetizers and the man said that what we ordered cost more than the buffet and he didn’t feel right not allowing us to have the buffet, “So, please, take some mango lassi and dessert and I will bring you bread.”  Well, so much for not pigging out!  It was really fun to try the new foods and it was all delicious!  I couldn’t even make room for ice cream after that I was so full.  We had gone to dinner kind of late and by the time we got home, the streets were packed with people coming downtown for the fireworks (aka Red, White and Boom! (emphasis on the Boom!)).  Luckily, we found a spot in our own complex and then we decided to walk down and watch the fireworks.  We walked to the Arena District where they had a sort of festival set up, found a patch of grass near the Nationwide complex and watched the show.  Someone near us brought their radio and a local station was playing music that went with the fireworks (I think Dan took a few good pictures that might be under the piictures tab now).  It was a nice way to end a long week of work.  And it was also nice not to get stuck in the traffic jam on our way home.  It’s good to live in walking distance to downtown… most of the time.