September 8 - 27: Off Street Cafe, Paige & Tiffany, cleaning, fixing computer, short lamp, and unavoidable gluten

There's this new word I've been hearing/using for the past few years: foodie. It's someone who's really into eating good (tasty) food. I'm not a foodie, but it seems like everyone else is.

Anyway, my cousin Mark got me hooked on this Food Network show called, "Restaurant: Impossible." This guy and his team help struggling restaurants turn around in only 2 days. It's actually a very nice show; you always feel warm and fuzzy at the end.

One of the restaurants on the show is the Off Street Cafe in Cerritos, CA. It's pretty close to us, so I wanted to try it out. We went for lunch.

The inside of the Off Street Cafe, after the makeover. Very white and cheery. I like the plates as wall decorations.

Although it was lunch time, they serve breakfast all day. Mark would want me to point out that all the food showing isn't his, even though it looks like it. :-)

Both our breakfasts were quite sufficient. For my starch side, I had to choose corn tortillas (gluten-free diet). Mark chose biscuits and gravy. You can see both in the picture. The tortillas worked really well with my meal, but I can't shake the feeling that Mark chose more wisely…

The Off Street Cafe's cinnamon roll. I think that's melted cream cheese on top. It was literally dripping off the cinnamon roll.

Mmmmm...

From Off Street Cafe

If you watch the episode of the show, you'll want to visit the cafe. One of the owners invested her entire retirement in the cafe and had been working there for decades. The other owner had so much trouble making ends meet that she was waitressing 30 hours per week to get by. All things considered, I give the Off Street Cafe 5 stars out of 5!

From Paige & Tiffany

These are my friends Paige & Tiffany. We're in the same Bible study group. Both girls were celebrating their birthdays that week. I had bought all these boxes of Gluten-Free Rice Krispies, so I made Rice Krispy treats.

One weekend, my relatives and I had a special mission: cleaning.

It started sprinkling that day. The drops reminded me of puppy feet.

My cousin Cindy was in charge of doing laundry. Lots of laundry. Halfway through the day, my cousin Pat and I went to help her out.

See, here we all, all smiles. Ready to do laundry.

Overall, I think Cindy ended up doing laundry for 9 hours straight. And I mean straight. We had half a dozen washers and dryers running in the laundromat continuously. (Did you know they have washers that can do 6 loads at once!) I don't remember sitting down once.

From Cleaning

So by the end, we were a little tired. But at least we could still laugh about it.

Our new motto is, "So many sheets!"

A few days later, I had to fix a computer for one of my uncles. The computer had simply been moved from one home to another in a car, but now it wasn't working.

From Fixing computer

I was stumped, but I called my friend Glenn in Sacramento; he's an expert at building and fixing PCs. I had to take this picture to remember where all the cables went.

In the end, Glenn led me in the right direction, and we saved an expensive trip to the repair shop. Whew! Glenn, thank you!

From Short lamp

Later, I was staying at an uncle's house, and we didn't have enough lighting in my room. But I found a small Chinese lamp and this lamp shade, so I made a short lamp. Isn't it cute?

On Day 90 of my gluten-free diet, I faced a dilemma. I was having dinner with one of my uncles, and he made me a stew.

From Unavoidable gluten

The stew definitely looked like it contained gluten/flour/pasta, and lots of it. But my uncle had never cooked anything for me before. Also, he had recently suffered a stroke.

In the end, it was an easy decision. I ate the stew with gusto. And then I had a second bowl to clean out the pot. I definitely felt bloated later that evening, something I hadn't felt since starting the gluten-free diet.

But the privilege of eating my recovering uncle's home-made stew? Priceless.