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The week in Malaysia ended well. Friday I did some phone interviews and then got to meet William for lunch, and YAY for that because he's a very special friend and it's always so good to sit and chat with him for a couple hours. Later I met up briefly with a friend from Fridae, someone I‘ve been chatting with for 3 years as he moves all over the world, and finally we were both in the same place at the same time. Later, Eddie came over for dinner and we got some good Chinese food, and I learned that in Malaysia, when the restaurant says they close at 10pm, they don't mean they close the doors to new customers but still keep serving the ones already in the restaurant...instead, they mean "get out." Still, we had some yummy food...I think I actually had General Tso's Chicken, though of course they don't call it that.

Saturday was a day for me to sleep late, then I got to try something I’d been waiting all week to try: J. Co. Donuts. For some reason I’ve been hearing a lot about these donuts and was determined to try them this week, to see if they’re worth queuing up for 45 minutes for. Fortunately we didn’t have to wait that long, but they were indeed yummy. Eddie and I each got three; mine were almonds and white chocolate, chocolate crunch, and white chocolate covered-and-filled. Oh, and when I got a coffee, I think the guy behind the counter liked me because he handed me a glazed donut Or maybe they do that for everyone. Anyway, in case you lost count, that makes 4 donuts…and that kinda filled me up.

Afterwards Eddie and I went to see Get Smart, because he surprised me by being a big Steve Carrell fan and told me that was something he really wanted to see. I wanted to see it too because of course I always watched and loved the show as a kid, and I remember it well from my childhood in the 70s. Of course, I don’t remember it with Malay and Chinese subtitles.

Saturday night was party night with the bloggers. Eddie agreed to go despite being kinda shy about meeting all these guys I’d been telling him about, though of course he blogs too so he should be included in such things. Alex and Jason came to pick us up and brought Jason Jr with them, and Froggy -- whom I hadn’t met before and who is an absolute doll -- linked up with us at the hotel. Off we went to an Indonesian restaurant which offered up some quite tasty dishes I’ll need to look for at the Indonesian place near my home in DC. Dr Paul and Alvin joined us there and Paul, who can handle anything I think, ordered a cow brain for dinner. I am pretty god about trying to new things but I drew the line at chewing on something that might think about me eating it.

Afterwards we rolled up to Lookout Point, a new destination that offers amazing views of KL (pics to follow, but as I’m writing this I still have work to do and don’t have time to deal with the camera and Picasa and Facebook and such). After a nice time at the café there we came back down the mountain to Marketplace, a new club for people like us. David joined us there, coming back to KL after working all day, the poor guy…he’d had a hard day and I really appreciated him coming back to see more one last time (and also bring some great new eyeglass frames for me to try…he’s going to make up 3 pair and send them to me YAY!!). Frankie joined us after appearing as a sexy bunny at another party, so we had most of the folks I met last year, minus Sam and Daniel who were a bit too tired to come play There was some drinking (Eddie got very tipsy) and dancing and then I called it an early evening around 1 as I knew it would be an early morning for me and unlike the rest of the boys, I really do need my beauty sleep.

This trip was great, and as always I was so happy to see all these great guys. Alex and Jason took good care of me with dinners and planning parties and such and were checking up on me all week. William got back from a weekend trip and immediately made time to get together. Cheryl arranged a really nice dinner at which I had my only non-Asian food of this trip so far (donuts apparently are originally from Indonesia, so they count as Asian food!). My dear dear friend Eddie took care of me on my first day there and again at the end, making sure I could enjoy the time after my work was done. And David, whom I’ve been getting to know better online the last few months after an all-too-brief meeting last fall, really opened up to me in a way that made me feel like a good person, and also arranged his time off this week so he could keep me from getting bored during my down time (and even came back when some meetings fell through and I suddenly found myself with nothing scheduled during the day). I am really lucky to have some very special people in my life in KL, something I wouldn’t have imagined only a year ago.

So, yeah…a great trip once again. And yes, I got a lot of work done, too. But that’s not worth blogging about.

Labels: Friends, Travel