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Tokyo Delves Sushi Bar

5239 Lankershim Blvd
North Hollywood, CA 91601

Last night I had the pleasure of going to Tokyo Delves Sushi Bar and Restaurant in North Hollywood, California. I was celebrating a friend’s birthday and successfully graduating from Pharmacy School. The sushi bar experience was extensive and it began outside waiting in line.

As I approached the exterior of the Tokyo Delves Sushi Bar, I saw a brightly lit neon façade of multiple colors. The sign made the sushi bar easy to find from the street in my car. I was able to park on the other side of Lankershim in a metered parking spot. But since it was after 6PM I didn’t have to feed the meter.

I talked with the bouncers who said that I needed to wait for my party to arrive. So I waited behind the red fabric tape. It reminded me of waiting to get inside a club. This was curious because when I talked with my friend I had the impression that the Tokyo Delves was just a restaurant, boy was I in for a surprise!

Everyone around me got carded except me, I guess my beard gave me away that I was over 21. The bouncer said, “You’re all good. We only card if you look under 25.” That made me feel good because usually I get carded all the time. After all my friends got to there one friend said that he and his girlfriend might not get let in because they were wearing sandal flip flops. So let that be a lesson that Tokyo Delves Sushi Bar may enforce a footwear dress code.

As we entered the Sushi Bar we were greeted by the staff that was cheering and yelling and giving everyone high fives as we entered. I knew I was in for a wild night. We were seated at a table for 14 and the waiter was wearing a bandanna and a long metal chain around his neck. He looked cool. To the table behind us, there was a waitress who was dancing with her hands up in the air and getting freaky trying to pump up the energy of the patrons. It worked. The people at the table started screaming riotously.

The waiter then encouraged everyone to take sake bombs. I don’t drink but I know how they work. The beer was in little mini wooden kegs (well, they were plastic, but they looked like wood).  First, you take a mug and fill it half way with Japanese beer. Then you take two chopsticks and put them about an inch apart on top of your mug. Next you take a shot of sake and put it on top. At this point your sake bomb should look like the picture. Finally, the waiter saw that I wasn’t setting up my sake bomb and he asked, “What’s up?”  I told him that I didn’t drink and he said, “Ok, I’ll get you a coke. But when I yell ‘sake’ you still have to yell ‘bomb’ got it?” I agreed and we all chanted along with the waiter as we slammed on the table and the hot sake fell into the mug. Everyone drank up and beer and sake got everywhere. But that was ok, because Tokyo Delves supplied us with blue towels to wipe up the table.

The sushi menu was pretty good. There was a small selection of nigiri (single slices of fish on top of white rice) sushi. But there were 4 different types of sushi family style platters of rolls to choose from. This made the ordering process go faster. None of us tried the cooked meat dishes like teriyaki chicken but they had that available for order.

In between ordering and getting our food. There was a lot of music and dancing. Girls from other tables danced with me and that was fun. Our birthday girl was encouraged to stand on her chair and have a dance-off contest to see if she could win a Sapporo T-Shirt. She didn’t win the shirt be she made it to the finals for the dance contest and that made my friend happy. The bartender did a great version of N-Sync lip singing and the rest of the staff kept the energy and fun up the entire night.

When we got our food it tasted good. I was surprised because I expected the sushi to taste like trash because of how the restaurant focused so much on entertainment. But I was surprised. The slices of fish were generously sized and my only complaint was that they only included a tiny bit of wasabi (wasabi is a Japanese style horseradish that is quite spicy).

After dinner there was a big performance of the waiters and bartenders doing songs and rocking out to the music. Everything was USA stars and strips inspired so the music and dress had a very patriotic theme. There was even a Jimi Hendrix impersonation with guitar playing on an inflatable toy. Overall the experience was very entertaining, and the price for my dinner was $30 since I didn’t drink and $50 per person for the people who did. The dinner and entertainment was about 2 hours and everyone seemed to have a good time. I would recommend Tokyo Delves Sushi Bar for anyone who wanted to party it up BIGTIME while having their sushi. If you are looking for a relaxing place to have sushi with your parents, this place isn’t for you. But if you want to drink and celebrate and dance on your chair, Tokyo Delves provides to perfect atmosphere for unbridled fun.

I have been using FTP (File Transfer Protocol) programs for years, and for the most part they are all the same. The average FTP client enables users to communicate to a FTP host either via a network or the internet. They all have similar functionalities: A place to enter an IP (Internet Protocol) address, upload and download functionality as well as certain perks like an address book, to store IP addresses and passwords so you don’t have to enter them every time.

Flash FXP

But Flash FXP by iniCom Networks is by far one of the best FTP programs out there. I have used Bulletproof FTP, Cute FTP and Cyberduck for Mac and Flash FXP stands apart. The main reason why I love Flash FXP is because it is extremely fast at sending commands to the FTP host. The easy to use interface allows users to quickly assess what Flash FXP is doing at the time. This permits the user to assess if there are any connection issues and login/password problems.

Flash FXP is also extremely compatible with different FTP hosts. This program will let you talk to your website, friends computer that is overseas or even an XBOX with the proper software installed. The program also has an extensive “Site Manager” feature which is similar to Cyberduck’s “keychain.”

Flash FXP GUI

The Site Manager allows the user to store information for different FTP hosts and keep them organized for quick access. The site manager is easy to use and looks like windows explorer. Overall Flash FXP’s GUI (Graphical User Interface) is well laid out and efficient.

I definitely recommend Flash FXP for windows users. It even has windows vista compatibility for Flash FXP version 3.6!

So in another post I mentioned that I was writing a book. Well every hand written book needs parchment. I decided to write the story on Cambridge 70 sheet writing pads by Mead. The writing pads are spiral bound and they are much more durable than a standard college spiral notebook.

The pads have the best features of a spiral bound notebook and a legal writing pad all in one. The Cambridge Writing Pads are sturdy. They have thin glossy cardboard covers, with sturdy cardboard backs. (The cardboard back works surprisingly well as an optical mouse pad.) The paper itself is yellow like a legal pad, but the quality of the paper is remarkably better. Each page turns easily and has the weight of two standard legal pad pages. The pages have 28 lines and are of legal length. They also have nice margins for writing notes or quick ideas. I used the margins for writing down chapter ideas and plot direction when they would pop into my mind. The margins were very useful for keeping track of new ideas without interrupting the flow of dialogue or narration.

At the top of the pages, the pads have medium strength metal spirals for keeping the thing together. I own four of these Cambridge 70 sheet writing pads by Mead and not one of them have uncoiled on me. No the spirals are quite strong and are able to withstand regular daily punishment of coming in and out of a backpack. In between the metal spiral and the rest of the page, there is perforation. This allows the writer to rip a page off the pad cleanly. I didn’t use this option very much, but when I did, the page did tear quite nicely.

I love writing and coffee shops. It is fun to go somewhere with the bustle of the occasional customer while working on my Compaq Pentium Dual-Core laptop. The white noise of people ordering their drinks and the whirring of blenders and the grinding of coffee beans makes the writing process flow easily from my fingertips.

Recently, my favorite coffee shop to work at has been Peet’s Coffee and Tea, next to the University of California at Irvine. I’ve been writing a Fantasy/Adventure novel that is inspired by the videogame Final Fantasy part I. Writing the book by hand has come very easily and I finished the story about two weeks ago at Peet’s.

Everything was going great. I had finished handwriting the 250 page book, and was preparing to type the book and edit it into chapters. But then I noticed something. I had started to gain weight and it really showed when I sat down. Retracing my diet over the course of the past month I realized that I had made a significant change. I had been drinking Caffé Mochas at Peet’s instead of drinking my standard China Green Tips hot tea from Starbuck’s.

So I took it upon myself to do a little research on exactly how many calories was in my Large Caffé Mocha with whipped cream. I usually ordered my mocha with whole milk instead of 2% because it is creamier. And I mean, if you are going to drink mocha, you might as well enjoy it to the fullest. This means having it served in a porcelain cup and letting the barista do his/her whipped cream swirling magic. One barista said the whipped cream and the chocolate in the mocha had a, “Symbiotic relationship of flavor.”  After checking online at Peet’s Coffee & Tea, official website for nutrition information I was able to view the nutritional information on my mocha.

Mocha

It seemed that my Large Caffé Mocha with whole milk and whipped cream had a whopping 503 calories. What? 503 calories, in a drink that I would finish in about 2 minutes! That was a quarter of my supposed daily caloric intake in a cup. No wonder I was gaining weight. The barista said that the whipped cream added 118 calories to the beverage and I wasn’t surprised. That ivory cream goodness was good every time. Especially when it melted into the top of the Mocha and made that bubbly ring of fatty delectableness!

Well, after carefully weighing my options I decided to switch back to hot tea. The Peet’s Coffee & Tea nutritional website didn’t even display the amount of calories in hot tea so I assume it is negligible. What’s in tea anyway, hot water and leaf juice?

The sugar free Caffe Mochoa

So now I’m feeling a bit less weighed down. And I have a bit more energy for blogging now that I am not drinking the Mocha’s. Oh, and if you think your large mocha at Starbuck’s is any different, think again. A Venti ( large) Café Mocha with whole milk and whipped cream at Starbuck’s is 450 calories.  It is about 50 calories less than at Peet’s. And I guess that 50 calorie difference is a big deal if you drink a big mocha every day. But overall mochas at Peet’s taste better. They use this Dutch chocolate that is so strong that you need to chase the Mocha with a glass of water. You might want to try the sugar free version of Peet’s Mocha if you are trying to save a few calories.

So the moral of the story is to avoid drinking your meals. That is, unless you are trying to gain weight. And try Peet’s loose leaf tea over a cup of steamed milk. I’m drinking the Jade Mist Organic tea right now…but that’s another story!