Tournament time - nothing is better

In two weeks, I will be surrounded by computer and TV screens, kicking off my favorite time of the year - tournament time!  I've mentioned my love for basketball and my even more intense love for college basketball before, but now it's time to discuss the crown jewel that is the NCAA D1 Men's Basketball Tournament.

To keep myself from spouting incoherently as I release a fire hose of everything I love about this tournament, I've tried to organize and highlight things in five main, somewhat chronological, categories:

Selection Sunday

The Sunday before the tournament starts, the tournament selection committee selects and reveals the teams they are inviting to the big dance.  Remember how I mentioned that in college, every game matters?  This moment is the culmination of everything that happened in the previous four months - every win, loss, margin, strength of schedule, etc.

Bubble teams (i.e. those for whom the invite isn't a foregone conclusion) find out if they've done enough to make it.  The shoe-ins find out if they've done enough to get a "better" seed.  All teams learn where they're playing and who their first opponent and potential future opponents will be.  And all of us start debating why the selection committee was right or wrong to overrate or snub or stack a region or lay out an easy path for so-and-so.

The Brackets

After the teams and seeding are revealed, we can start predicting who will win each game and ultimately the entire tournament.  Every year I am horrible at filling out my bracket, but I still do it.  In the beginning, it's kind of fun to see if I actually select the correct upsets.  For games where I don't care who wins, it gives me someone to root for, if only because I randomly wrote the team's name on a line a few days earlier.

I think the best thing about the bracket is it brings people who normally don't follow basketball into this world.  It doesn't take any skill or knowledge to fill out a bracket, and even if you have no idea what's happening in the game, you know who wins (the team that scores the most points) and you can trash talk with your friends about how you got it right.

Single-Elimination Format

Arguably the core characteristic of the tournament is its single-elimination format, which means every game will be one team's last for the season.  While everything during the regular season mattered going into Selection Sunday, after that, the only thing that matters is what happens during the current 40 minutes the team happens to be playing.  This win-or-go-home format is what makes it possible for less talented teams to go further in the tournament than the most talented team.  It's why it's so exciting - the stakes are higher and unexpected outcomes more likely.  Oh the drama!  It's why, even if my team's not playing or if they've been eliminated, I still love watching.

The First Weekend

If I had to choose just one part of the tournament to watch, it would be the first weekend.  The tournament is essentially structured into three consecutive weekends.  All the games of the first two rounds are played in the first weekend (Thursday through Sunday).  Then there's a break until the following Thursday, which begins the next weekend when all the games of the next two rounds, the Sweet Sixteen and Elite Eight, are played.  And finally, the Final Four and Championship Game are played the Saturday and Monday of the week after that.

Since there are 64 teams when the tournament starts, that means they have to fit 48 games into the first weekend.  That means it's back-to-back games during nearly all my waking hours all weekend, at times with multiple games happening at the same time.  That's why I need multiple screens.  There's so much happening and the potential for so many exciting and wonderful moments.  You could see a nail-biting buzzer-beater in one game, change the channel, and see another one a few seconds later.  You see so many teams with different styles of play and match ups that would never be scheduled during the regular season.  Multiple upsets can happen in one day.  Games go into overtime.  It's non-stop emotion.  One great moment after another.

One Shining Moment

On the subject of great moments, the tournament is not complete until we hear the final notes of One Shining Moment.  After the final buzzer sounds, after the champions receive their trophy, we're treated to a sentimental montage of clips from throughout the tournament set to a cheesy but lovable song.

The NCAA March Madness Facebook page has been posting One Shining Moments from the past 30 years, and I've loved watching them.  Some of them I saw the first time they were aired but most are new to me, since they were before I started watching basketball.  Even if I have no affiliation with the teams in them, they still give me a great feeling.

Ironically, the only One Shining Moment that didn't make me all sappy was the one created when my team won the championship in 2010.  That's because that year they decided to cut in video of the singer singing in a studio in between footage of the tournament.  Kind of takes you out of the moment...  So for that year, I prefer the video Duke Blue Planet put together, set against the classic and dulcet tones of Luther Vandross.  (Warning: Duke haters, which I realize is most of the country, you may not like this version either.)

One Shining Moment is probably the best encapsulation of why this tournament is special to me - you experience the emotion of the players, coaches, and fans.  It's a wonderful celebration.

Alice's Tea Cup - fairytale food

One of the NYC restaurants I love is Alice's Tea Cup.  They have three locations, and each one is a cute little space decorated with fairy wings and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland-inspired art and knickknacks.  Even better than the magical environment is the delectable menu.  The tea selection is huge.  Breakfast/brunch entrees, sandwiches, and salads are all delicious.  And desserts and pastries are scrumptious.

Imagine my joy when I discovered they have a cookbook!  I tend not to buy many cookbooks because they usually have just one or two recipes I want and the rest are filler, but I want to make almost everything in the Alice's Tea Cup cookbook.  One of my favorite recipes in the book is for chocolate cake.  It always comes out moist and not overly sweet.  Here's a summary of the recipe:

2 cups sugar
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 cup sour cream
2 eggs
1 cup whole milk
1/2 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup hot brewed coffee

Sift together the dry ingredients.  Mix in the rest (except the coffee) with a mixer on medium speed for 2 minutes.  Decrease the mixer to low speed and drizzle in the coffee until everything is blended.  The batter will be very liquidy.  Bake for 20-25 minutes at 350° F.

The book also has a recipe for vanilla buttercream frosting that you can put on the cake!  But this book isn't just full of desserts.  It also contains recipes for brunch, soups, salads, sandwiches, scones, tea concoctions, and party planning suggestions.  You can even learn how to tea-dye fabrics.

So if you're not in NYC, or you don't want to wait to get a table during their busy weekend brunch hours, get the Alice's Tea Cup cookbook and enjoy making and eating your own meal.  Who says tea parties are only for children?

Warming up with ramen from Ichiran

It's been a little while since my last post.  I've been working on some projects and also took a trip overseas.  During the last week of 2015, I was in the wonderful city of Tokyo.  As it was my first time actually in the city and not just the airport, I saw a lot of sites and ate a lot of food.  But one dish is still the subject of my cravings during these cold days back in the States - Ichiran's tonkotsu ramen.

Ramen is a noodle dish, and there are many different styles of ramen.  Tonkotsu ramen consists of pork-based broth.  With pork being one of my favorite meats, I suspected I at least wouldn't dislike eating at Ichiran.

Ichiran is a chain restaurant in Japan, and it specializes in tonkotsu ramen.  In fact, it serves only tonkotsu ramen.  You can customize your dish by adding extra ingredients or selecting different amounts of flavoring of firmness of noodles, but it is essentially just one dish served in the entire restaurant.  And Ichiran does an amazing job with that one dish.

The first thing that drew me towards Ichiran was the price.  For just the "basic" bowl of ramen, without adding any extras, you pay less than $7 USD.  In any city, let alone Tokyo, that's a bargain for a meal, and your stomach leaves satisfied with both quantity and taste.  The basic bowl consists of noodles, broth, green onion, garlic, sliced pork, and Ichiran's own red sauce.  If you don't want onion, garlic, pork, or red sauce, you can specify that in your order.

To order, you start at a vending machine.  You insert cash and then press buttons to make your selection.  Your selections are printed out on little slips of paper printed by the machine.  You can just order the basic bowl of ramen, but if you know you want to add additional ingredients (boiled egg, seaweed, extra pork, extra noodles, etc.), you can select those buttons for a nominal extra fee.  (An egg costs $1, and refilling your noodles is just a bit over $1.)  You can also order drinks or dessert at this point.  Don't worry, if you don't order extras and decide later while you're eating that you'd like to add a boiled egg or want more noodles, you can order them at your seat.

After the vending machine, you get a larger slip of paper that allows you to customize your noodles.  For example, you can choose how firm you want the noodles cooked, if you want pork, how much garlic or red sauce you want, the type of green onion you want, how strong you want the broth flavor.  I selected "medium" for everything, 1/2 red sauce, green onion, with pork, and the maximum garlic that didn't incur an additional charge.

Waiting for your seat can be a bit like a game.  Ichiran is structured kind of like a bar with dividers separating each seat.  As one person finishes their meal and leaves, the next person in line takes their place.  If you're there with a group, it will likely take longer to get seated if you want to sit together, since you'd have to wait for multiple seats next to each other to become available.  If you don't mind being split up, then the turnover happens pretty quickly, since the dividers help people focus on eating rather than just sitting around.  Of course in popular areas, you'll still have to wait a while outside before being able to order and then wait a while inside before a seat becomes available.

Once you sit down, you put your order slips at the edge of the window of your individual booth and call for the waiter using a button on the table.  They'll take your order slips and after not much wait, you get your food.  If you decide you want to order extra noodles or ingredients, there's another slip in your booth that you can fill out and pay for at the table.  There's a curtain that they pull down to cover the window of your booth between you and the wait staff, so if you need to call them over for some reason during the meal, just press the button.  Unless you're getting more noodles, however, there really isn't any need for them.  Just enjoy your meal, and when you're done, get up and leave.

Ichiran was one of my tastiest experiences in Tokyo.  I loved it so much that I had it twice while I was in Tokyo.  Normally I don't repeat meals when I'm visiting a new place because I want to try as much as possible, but this ramen was too good not to have again.

Now back in NYC, all the ramen here doesn't seem so great, especially when you take into account that it's more expensive.  Why would I wait an hour for ramen that's twice as expensive and half as tasty?  I've seen some articles saying Ichiran is going to open a location in NYC.  When that finally happens, I hope they maintain the pricing and quality that I experienced in Japan.  If they can make it work in Tokyo, a city that's more expensive and has more quality restaurant competition than NYC, wouldn't they be able to make it work here?

Love Actually - a Christmas staple

I'm on the bus listening to my music on shuffle and a great song, Songbird by Eva Cassidy, comes on and reminds me of one of my favorite soundtracks in one of my favorite films, Love Actually.  How can you get through the Christmas season without watching this movie at least once?  Many movies have tried to copy its intertwined multi-story format but haven't been successful in eliciting as strong emotions.

A big reason why Love Actually works so well year after year is the brilliant writing of Richard Curtis.  (By the way, he also wrote one of my favorite Doctor Who episodes, Vincent and the Doctor.)  Although we only get short vignettes of every storyline - in some cases literally just a beginning, middle, and end - the characters are so well-developed we instantly become attached to them.  He also manages to navigate a range of emotions in short succession.  The movement between funny, poignant, cute, heartbreaking, solemn, and romantic is seamless.

It also helps that the cast is full of talent.  Liam Neeson expertly plays the tortured father, but his "special set of skills" in this movie is less violent.  Emma Thompson makes us all cry when she tries not to cry.  Bill Nighy brings out his wild side, delivering a strong performance as we'd expect from him.  Colin Firth and Hugh Grant each bumble in their own way, as they know how to do so well.  Laura Linney is just stellar.  This film also happens to be the first time I saw Joanna Page, Martin Freeman, and Nina Sosanya - all of whom are some of my favorite actors now.  And that's just a partial list of the cast.

In addition to the writing and the acting, what really makes the film work is the music.  I can't talk about the music without mentioning the amazing voice of the then 10-year-old Olivia Olson.  I prefer her "All I Want for Christmas" over Mariah Carey's.  That song and almost every song from the movie are on my commuting playlist.  The soundtrack is one great song after another, and the way they're used in the background makes each scene have more impact.  Richard Curtis mentions in the commentary that he always has music playing when he's writing, and the songs picked in the final edit really fit what he's written.

So whether you kick back and watch Love Actually or take part in another tradition, I hope you have a relaxing and wonderful Christmas.

Sweet tea - my southern comfort

I spent two years living in the South, and I enjoyed it even more than I expected.  A key part of my time there was spent eating the great food and BBQ.  For all the good and bad, I became obsessed with sweet tea.

Sweet tea is a traditional drink prevalent in all areas of the South.  It's not just iced tea with sugar added.  (I actually prefer that type of iced tea unsweetened.)  It's made differently and tastes much better.  The good of my obsession is how delicious sweet tea can be and how comforted it makes me feel.  The bad, of course, is the sugar content, but even worse, in my mind, is how difficult it is to get a good glass of it now that I'm living in the north again.

While I was down south, my favorite place to get this sweet nectar was a fast food chicken and biscuits chain called Bojangles.  They also had scrumptious biscuits and gravy, but the sweet tea was always my favorite.  Before leaving town to move back north, my last stop was Bojangles to buy 6 half gallon jugs of sweet tea to take with me.  Whenever I go back to visit, it's my first stop.

I've been told it's not that difficult to make sweet tea, but I've also never bothered to look up a recipe. I recently found a cookbook published by Southern Living that includes a recipe for sweet tea along with a bunch of other southern goodies.  Maybe I'll take a look and start making my own - create a little bit of the South in my northern kitchen.

Thankful for TV Binging

Happy Thanksgiving!  I am thankful for many things, including all of you that read and support my blog.  It truly has been very helpful and means a lot to me.  I wish you and all your loved ones many blissful moments.

One great thing about long holiday weekends is being able to binge watch TV and catch up on or start shows you've been meaning to watch.  Here are two of my favorites that are pretty quick to get through.  Really I was just going to mention one, but since it's a bit dark and heavy, I thought I'd throw in a comedy for those of you that want to watch something lighter during the holiday.

Broadchurch
This series follows a small seaside town as it copes with and tries to find the culprit in the murder of an 11-year-old boy.  Leading the investigation are a detective brought in from out of town, who seems to be damaged and have secrets of his own (David Tennant), and a capable and kind local who was passed up for a promotion when he came in to fill that role (Olivia Colman).  As the series unfolds, we find that in this small town where everyone knows each other, everyone has secrets to hide and anyone could be guilty.  You're left guessing whodunit right up until the end.  Even the cast didn't find out who the murderer was until near the end of filming.

In addition to gripping writing and amazing acting, the tellers of this story were brilliant in their choices for cinematography, editing, and music.  It's no wonder it received such critical acclaim, awards, and viewer popularity.  It was brought back for a second series with a different crime at the center of the story, so if you have time after watching the first series, go ahead and watch the second.

The Thick of It
One of the funniest shows I've seen, this political comedy follows the ridiculous (and maybe not that far off) dealings of Members of Parliament and their staff.  The star of the show is a character named Malcolm Tucker, wonderfully played by Peter Capaldi, who is the character we all know exists in politics everywhere but who we may not always know by name.  He's the spin doctor, the puppeteer, the guy that can "convince" people to act, speak, and vote in the way that's needed at the time.  In real life we hate them, but as a TV character, we can't help but love this particular foul-mouthed incarnation.

Just a warning, there is a lot of foul language in The Thick of It, so if you're sensitive to that, I'd recommend watching something else.  Another comedy I like is Rev. - It's about a vicar and his relationships with his parish, the church, and his family.  It's funny, sweet, and also has the lovely Olivia Colman in a very different role than the one she plays in Broadchurch.  (For some reason, the third season of Rev. doesn't seem to be on Amazon at this time, but it may be available on Hulu.)

So those are my two (or three) picks for this Thanksgiving weekend.  Something entertaining to avoid the stress and mess of shopping.  If you need a shopping fix, you can always shop online while watching these shows.  Why deal with grumpy, swear-y, aggressive shoppers when you can watch grumpy, swear-y, aggressive, but lovable characters on TV?

Basketball - from the NBA to college

It's almost time!  In two days, we see the first official game of the college basketball season.  I love watching college basketball and have since 2000, but every year between April and October/November, I seem to forget how much.  When I watch that first game in the fall, I am consumed by bliss stronger than I anticipated.  No matter what happened that day, I instantly feel great.

I've written and talked about my history with basketball quite a bit in school applications, job interviews, and elsewhere, but for those of you not familiar with the story . . .

I haven't always had such kind feelings towards basketball.  I remember going to my brother's games when we were younger, but I don't actually remember watching much.  I was probably finding some other form of entertainment like climbing on and under the bleachers or checking out the concessions stand while the game was going on.  I remember getting Gene Keady's autograph but really only finding it interesting/exciting because other people found it interesting/exciting.  And I definitely felt some resentment towards my high school athletics department in general because they kept getting funding even though our teams were not very good while the music department experienced cuts and had some of the best choirs in the region.

But in 1998, my attitude started to soften.  I accidentally started watching the NBA Eastern Conference Finals between the Chicago Bulls and Indiana Pacers.  As often happened, I was doing homework with the TV on, and I was too lazy to change the channel.  I caught myself watching the game, and I became hooked.  Maybe Reggie Miller's three-pointers have some hypnotic quality.  I actively tuned in to the rest of the finals, disappointed when the Pacers lost and thrilled when the Bulls beat the Jazz.

For years after that, I followed the finals closely, picking which team I would support on a series-by-series basis.  Growing up in an area where the closest NBA team were the Toronto Raptors, I didn't have any strong allegiances. Which brings me to college basketball.

While I became a fan of the NBA in '98, I still didn't have much interest in college, high school, or any other form of basketball.  Those other games just didn't seem as exciting.  Then team allegiance sucked me in.  I got into a college that had a decent team.  Even before I finished the first semester of my senior year in high school, I started following the Stanford Cardinal.  Not having cable, I couldn't watch the game, but I definitely knew and celebrated when Stanford beat Duke in the Pete Newell Challenge in December 2000.  And I closely watched and followed every game in the NCAA tournament that season, and every season since then.  (More on the tourney some other time.  It deserves it's own post.)

Having a team to root for made the game that much better.  And the more I watched college basketball, the more I appreciated the strategy, skill, team dynamics, leadership, etc.  It quickly overtook my love of the NBA, which to me had more flash but not as much heart and soul.

The best part of college basketball was being able to watch all the home games in person.  Before college, I had never gone to a live game, other than my brother's or my high school's.  There's nothing like watching 10 talented players and 2 legendary coaches battle it out while standing on the floor, center court, with just two rows of rich people in folding chairs in front of you.  In college, every single game matters, and everyone involved cares deeply about what happens and the outcome.

That's why, come Friday night, you know what I'll be doing.