DVDeals 5/18 - 5/24

DVD Tuesday
There will be 2 editions of National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets this upcoming Tuesday. The regular edition is cheapest @ Circuit City... $13.99, but the 2-disc special edition has the lowest price @ Best Buy... $22.99.

Circuit City Deals
- Firewall for $4.99
- Patriot (Extended Ed.) for $4.99
- Fast and Furious for $4.99
- 2 Fast 2 Furious for $4.99
- Dragon for $4.99
- Van Helsing for $4.99
- First Blood for $4.99
- Doom for $4.99
- Unleashed (Unrated Ed.) for $4.99
- Air Force One for $4.99
- Rundown for $4.99
- Top Gun (Collector's Ed.) for $4.99
- Fugitive for $4.99

2 for $12 @ Best Buy
- Independence Day
- Predator
- Alien
- AVP
- i, Robot
- League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
- X-Men
- X2

9th Avenue Food Festival

I could've sworn that I checked the schedule a few months back and saw that the food festival was going to be on May 24 & 25... the weekend of our cruise. Fortunately, my coworker, Frank told me it was this weekend. The timing was perfect because it gave me a nice cultural event I could take my out-of-town cousins to. And today, they had to be back in Queens by 3pm for a wedding. So the length of the event fit the schedule just right. We got there around 11:30pm and walked around until about 1pm, trying various foods.


Be sure to click on the slideshow to access the Picasa Web album as I have written comments for individual photos.

Joe's Shanghai

Location: 136-21 37th Ave., Flushing, NY
Cuisine: Chinese
Hours: SUN-THU (11am-11pm); FRI-SAT (11am-12am)
Phone: (718) 539-383, (718) 539-4429
Website: www.joeshanghairestaurants.com
Prices: About $7 per person
Credit Cards: Cash only

Food: 8
Service: 8
Value: 8
Environment: 8

Frequency: Frequent

The rest of the crew (Auntie Remy, Auntie Ida, I4 & Edwin) arrived last night. Earlier in the day, my parents took them shopping at Woodbury Commons. I met up with all of them at about 9pm for supper & Joe's Shanghai. We try to take all of our out-of-town visitors here even though it's hard to get in. This restaurant seems to be always crowded, even during the "off-peak" hours. Can you believe that we had to wait in line @ 9pm on a Thursday night!?


Joe's Shanghai is famous for it's Xiao Long Bao or soup dumplings. There are 2 flavors... pork and crab meat. Both have a meatball in the middle and are filled with a tasty broth. They're brought out in a hot a bamboo steamer. The best way to grab one without breaking the skin (and spilling/losing the soup) is to pinch it from the top with chopsticks or tongs. Then you place the dumpling on your soup spoon. The soup on the inside is very hot, so you'll want to bite a small hole and sip slowly. The spoon will catch anything you missed. Once you're done with the soup, make sure the rest of it is cool enough before you take a bite.

Many customers just go here for the Xiao Long Bao. I've seen tables with bamboo steamers at each seat. I always suggest that when I'm there with my family, but I guess they feel weird about going to a Chinese restaurant and ordering only one dish and want to show our guests some variety. The Xiao Long Bao is one of the best foods I've ever had. I rated Joe's Shanghai an 8 because their other foods are just OK... you can do the same or better in many of Flushing's restaurants.

The place itself is very clean and decorated with classical Chinese furniture. There are flat-screen TVs on both sides of the restaurant that are usually tuned into the current game or a Chinese TV series. The only problem with Joe's Shanghai is it's size... especially for the amount of business it rings in. The restaurant is tiny and was never upgraded from its original layout. They could've easily moved into a larger space or renovated the layout so that they could seat more customers. The place would still be full and the lines maybe a bit shorter. Maybe the owner didn't want to take the risk or just couldn't find a low period to shutdown.

Donations to China & Myanmar

After the recent cyclone of Myanmar and earthquake of China, a large portion of the world's population were wiped out and that number continues to grow as the threat of plague increases. I've compiled a list of sites you could donate to based on CNN's old list. I personally link-checked all of them to make sure these 2 recent disasters were covered and easy to get to:

• AmeriCares
• ADRA
• American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, Inc.
• Church World Service
• Episcopal Relief and Development
• Food for the Hungry
• International Orthodox Christian Charities
• Islamic Relief
• Lutheran World Relief
• MercyCorps
• Medical Teams International
• Operation USA
• Oxfam International
• Plan USA
• Project Hope
• UMCOR
• UNICEF
• World Emergency Relief
• World Relief
• World Vision

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Thank you.

QM2 Prologue

The upcoming trip won't be be first meeting with Queen Mary 2. On Friday, April 23, 2004, she slowly sailed down the Hudson River, passing by my office. Those with window seats lined up by the windows and alerted everyone else in the office. I think it was Trista that got me as she had just taken pictures from outside with her camera phone. I quickly ran out with the department's outdated and underpowered 1.3 MP PowerShot A50 and was able to get some good shots as the gigantic ship passed by the park behind the Wiley office. Several helicopters were also circling the ship for security and they looked like tiny flies in comparison.

QM2 Stats
Length: 1,132 ft
Weight: 150,000 gross tons
Passengers: 2,620
Crew: 1,253
Top Speed: Approximately 30 knots (34.5 mph)
Power: 157,000 hp

Click here for my 2004 photos

Related: Cunard, Frommers.com

Mother's Day

Mother's Day included more than just my family this time. Uncle Charlie from the Philippines was in town with some of his friends. This was the first group to arrive for an upcoming group vacation on Queen Mary 2. Since there were 9 people in total and a lot of dishes, we ate in my parents' basement. The food was a mix of homemade dishes, Korean fried chicken and desserts from a Filipino grocery.

DVDeals 5/11 - 5/17

DVD Tuesday
Drawn Together: Season 3 comes out this Tuesday. It doesn't matter where you buy it though. It's $19.99 in all stores. If there's something else on your shopping list that allows you to qualify for FREE shipping at Amazon or Buy.com, go for one of those.

Best Buy Deals
- Walk the Line for $7.50
- Kill Bill Vol. 1 for $7.50
- Kill Bill Vol. 2 for $7.50
- Spiderman for $5.99
- Spiderman 2 for $5.99

Circuit City Deals
- Gladiator for $8.99
- Braveheart for $8.99
- Best of Chapelle's Show for $8.99
- Dragon for $4.99

QM2 Cast

Besides my family, the following people will also be gearing up for the Queen Mary 2 Memorial Weekend Cruise:

Uncle Charlie: Mom's brother-in-law, has lived with us in NY during my childhood
Uncle Mike: Uncle Charlie's friend, Uncle Ramon's classmate
Auntie Emma: Uncle Mike's wife
Tin Tin: Mike & Emma's daughter
Mia: Mike & Emma's daughter
Auntie Ida: Mom's oldest sister
Edwin: Auntie Ida's son
Ifore (I4): Uncle Charlie's son
Auntie Remy: Mom's younger sister, I4's Mom
Auntie Day: Mom's cousin
Uncle Hal: Auntie Day's husband
Uncle Mario: Family friend
Auntie Susan: Uncle Mario's wife

Knight Rider (NBC 2008)

Story: 7
Action: 6
Acting: 6
FX: 7
Durability: 7

I missed the original airing of the new Knight Rider because it was during the NBA All-Star Weekend. Luckily NBC has the movie in its entirety available on their website as a steaming video.

The star of the show is KITT, the AI controlled sports car. My favorite part about this movie was that they really featured KITT. He was the main hero and got the most screen time. Unlike the classic version, which was a Camaro, the latest KITT is the new Shelby GT500KR, one of my favorite cars. It would have been interesting to see a version of KITT as the 2009 Camaro, but I have no complaints about the change in models. The GT500KR is the perfect combination of speed and a powerful looking shape. The voice of KITT was Val Kilmer. I never made the connection before, but Kilmer really sounds like KITT. He has a calm, cool voice which is perfect for the personality of the car.

The acting was probably at the level of a regular TV movie... OK, but not as good as a full blown motion picture. The story continues off of the original series with the same amount of time passing by as real life, to put the long-time fans in perspective. The hero of the new movie (and upcoming series) is Mike Tracer, son of Michael Knight. The FX were pretty good for a TV movie. They also did a good job of building up the action, but I just didn't feel it ended in a bang. Maybe it's because they want to ease into the series. More to come in the Fall.

Related: IMDB, Knight Rider (streaming video), NBC Official Site

Alien vs. Predator: Requiem

Story: 6
Action: 6
Acting: 7
FX: 7
Durability: 7
Special Features: 7

I rarely buy movies without seeing them first, but went for this one because I liked the original AVP. I also figured that any movie with both the Alien and Predator in it would at least have OK special effects even if the acting was bad. The story picked up where AVP left off, but the atmosphere is completely different. It doesn't take place on an alien site, but right in the middle of a town in Colorado. It certainly made it more interesting that way and gave it a sense of realism. One complain regarding continuity is that Alexa Woods (Sanaa Lathan) from AVP wasn't in it. If there were creatures like this running around, and news got out, there would be some connection to the incident in the first movie. Requiem takes place immediately after it too.

The action was OK, but I expected more. I wanted to see more rumbling between the Predator, Aliens and Predalien. It also would've been nice to have more than one Predator, like in the first movie. I felt that there was too much screen time given to the humans. The title isn't Humans vs. Aliens after all. The effects were pretty good, but again, I expected more. A sequel should always top its predecessor and I don't think Requiem did the job.

The special features on the DVD were very complete. It has 2 commentary tracks and a handful of featurettes. I ended up getting the 2-disc special edition DVD Tuesday, which included a digital copy on the 2nd disc. I installed it on my PC in WMV format and on my Mac in iTunes and both versions look great. Hopefully more DVD releases in the future include this option.