Saturday, November 2, 2013

November 2nd 2013: Visiting 2 Zoos in the Southeastern Eighth Circle

Today, after visiting the Rhode Island Comic Con in Providence RI, I decided to go sightsee a little in the city of Attleborough, choosing to visit the Capron Park Zoo while it was still open. This place is pretty small,





















but I was still able to take several nice pictures of the animals kept here.
Argentine Black and White Tegu
Emu











Red Kangaroos
Ring Tailed Lemurs











Boer Goats and Alpacas
Black and White Ruffed Lemurs











Indian Crested Porcupine
Victoria Crowned Pigeon











Purple Swamphen
Red Crested Cardinal










Superb Starling
Agouti











Chaco Golden Stripe Tarantula
Fennec Fox

DeBrazza's Monkey
Serval











Visayan Warty Pig
Japanese Macaque











Red Crowned Crane
Hornbills













Amur Leopard

Some interesting things I saw here was a white lion,










an overprotective Southern Screamer dad who kept jumping at the screen separating me from him to protect the eggs under the mother nearby.
It was also cool to learn the differences between river and sea otters, which have different feet shapes and webbing for practical purposes, and that river otters swim belly down while sea otters swim belly up.

Heading out of the zoo, the park itself is pretty nice as well.





























There was an inquisitive squirrel here who thought I had something to feed him.
From here, I visited a few places in town
Seventh Day Adventist Church
Bartek Recreation Center
First Baptist Church
United Pentecostal Church
Word of Truth Baptist Church
St. Joseph's Church
before heading to the Attleborough Arts Museum to check it out.

This place is pretty small, and they were having a live auction later in the night, so the pieces were all arranged differently today.


















































From here, I headed into Norton, visiting the Winslow Farm Wildlife Sanctuary first. This place is more a farm than a zoo, located within the wilderness and by Meadowbrook Pond.

































Meadowbrook Pond
Other places I visited in Norton follow.
Winnecunnet Lake
Chartley United Methodist Church










Chartley Pond,
West Main Street and South Worcester Street
I headed next into Easton,
Memorial,
Depot Street and Center Street

Fire Station #3
DPW Water Division










Evangelical Congregational Church
bedofre heading to Canton for a meal at Gourmet Garden, a Chinese-Japanese restaurant. The decor here was actually pretty decent for a place located within a strip mall,
With my groupon, I decided to get the Grilled Chicken Satay Salad, the Phil's Amazing Special (Tuna, Salmon, white fish, crabstick, avocado, dipped in tempura batter, fried with chef's special sauce) and the New Wave Maki (spicy tuna inside, yellowtail, salmon, avocado outside, tempura crumb with 3 kinds of special sauce on top).
Grilled Chicken Satay Salad
Phil's Amazing Special












New Wave Maki
The salad was pretty terrible in terms of what I paid and what I got. The chicken was just one big cutlet, and the satay sauce was mediocre at best. The special wasn't that special either, with nothing amazing to it and the meat was all cooked and dry. Only the raw fish was really good, and probably saved the entire meal.

Overall, I'll give this small town place the benefit of the doubt, especially due to the nice decor.

From here, I headed straight to my next and last meal of the day, at the West Bridge Restaurant in Cambridge. This place is pretty modern and chic, which is usually the case for the places my friends like to go to.

We ordered a lot of appetizers as I was still very full from my previous meal.

Our starters, made of chicken skin, was very interesting in presentation and tasty. This made me look forward to the rest of the dishes we got.
The first one that arrived was the Egg in a Jar (duck egg, hen of the woods, pomme puree, crisp skin). It was pretty interestingly presented again, and to have egg with mashed potatoes was an interesting concept as well. However, it came out tasting like plain mashed potatoes and nothing special. It was still tasty though especially with the crispiness aspect to it.
The next dish was the Crispy Pig's Head (Prosciutto, cured egg, bagna cauda). We were disappointed that no head came served on a platter, but cubes of meat that seemed like pulled pork in texture in taste. A bit of a disappointment to say the least, although still not too bad.
The Schnitzel (Beef Heart, kimchi, pecan, yogurt) came next. The meat itself was a little hard, given it was made of beef heart, but overall, I like the combination of ingredients in this dish, especially the kimchi.

I could hardly see the snails in the Burgundy Snails (Salsify, yeast, mushrooms) dish, but they were there alright. I actually thought the salsify strips were actually strips of pasta, hence I was surprised at their vegetable texture and taste when I ate it.
The Oxtail and Celery Root (sunchoke, apple, pistachio) was much like the pig's head, a disappointment with no tail in sight and just balls of meat. The ingredients here did not make much sense either, although it was okay overall.
Finally our main dish, the Venison (squash, cranberry, freekeh) came. Very good presentation, and the ingredients again were exquisite, except that the meat was a little too dry for me, being a rare person and all. Overall, not too bad.
Overall, I would give this place a recommend, although I agreed with my friend that there are similar places like this in town that serve slightly better food.

With that, my day of exploring, with 2 zoos in the bag, came to an end.

Recommended Places to Visit: Norton

Recreation
Water Bodies
Norton Reservoir
Mansfield Avenue and Freeman Street

Barrowsville Pond
~40 Power Street

Winnecunnet Lake
20 Bay Road

Chartley Pond
West Main Street and South Worcester Street


Museums
Winslow Farm Wildlife Sanctuary
37 Eddy Street


Architecture
Monuments
Norton Water Tower
55 West Main Street

Norton Library Park
68 East Main Street

Norton Common
Mansfield Avenue and Library Square


Places of Worship

Unitarian Church
2 West Main Street

Chartley United Methodist Church
78 South Worcester Street


Schools
Wheaton College
26 East Main Street


Town Facilities
Public Library
68 East Main Street


Schools
Norton Middle School
215 West Main Street

J.C. Solmonese School
315 West Main Street


Historical Buildings
Old Library Building
Mansfield Avenue and Library Square

Friday, November 1, 2013

November 1st 2013: My Second Halloween Party in 2 Weeks

Spending yesterday and today at home, terribly sick, I had a Halloween Party to go to tonight at Osaka, a Japanese restaurant located in Brookline. As I was one of the co-organizers of the event, I had to go despite my health condition. Bringing my Zorro getup to Brookline, I was a little early, so I decided to get a cup of Hot Chocolate from Peet's Coffee and Tea next door to warm myself up.
My friends came soon after, and we headed to the restaurant to have dinner before the party started.

We ordered a lot of food, although I had to get my friend to pick out food for me as I was still feeling extremely sick. We got the Gyoza (Pan fried dumplings), the Spicy Kani Salad (Crab Meat Salad), the Green Seaweed Salad (Japanese style), the Chicken Yaki Udon (Sauteed Thick noodles with fish cake and vegetables), the NOBU ROLL (Seared tuna, asparagus inside, tuna, salmon, eel, yellowtail, crunchy three colors tobiko on top with chef special sauce), the Assorted Tempura, the HIDDEN DRAGON (Shrimp tempura, spicy tuna and papaya topped with spicy king crab meat.), the FOXY LADY (Spicy tuna, avocado topped with seared tuna and red wine pear. Served with onion sauce) and the TOMO (Spicy crunchy salmon, mango. Topped with seared salmon, white tuna, avocado, and crispy rice powder and honey wasabi sauce).
Gyoza
Spicy Kani Salad

Green Seaweed Salad
Chicken Yaki Udon











Nobu Roll
Assorted Tempura








Tomo



Hidden Dragon
Foxy Lady











The gyoza and the seaweed salad were pretty good, while the Kani salad was just so-so. The tempura was pretty interesting as they had tempura noodles, and the udon was alright I guess. With respect to the maki, the presentation was actually pretty good, especially the Tomo, but the Foxy Lady and the Hidden Dragon tasted a little weird. Thankfully, the other 2 rolls were delicious.

Soon after dinner, we headed downstairs to decorate the lounge, but once the party started, I was too sick to mingle, so I stayed in one corner most of the night, catching up with my friends occasionally, some of whom had on outlandish costumes tonight. At the end of the night, my friend wearing a sumo fat costume and a lady wearing a large tampon on her head were the winners of Best Costume. A pity that organizers were not allowed to win. I'm just glad I managed to get home safely.