Last Wednesday, over a hundred hungry bloggers invaded TriNoma (Hate that name. Why is the N capitalized and the M not? Drives me nuts.) for a food tour organized by Yehey. Since free food was involved, of course I showed up.

We were divided into groups and herded like sheep along rows of restaurants. I normally don't like to be a sheep, but they were feeding me all kinds of food, so... baaah. I didn't take enough pictures or remember enough details to give you a useful recap, so I won't. Other bloggers have said enough about it anyway. Yay for laziness.

Check out this sad scene from Bubba Gump....

We did get to sample some of their other food items, but that photo op table was pure mental torture. It should be illegal to make people look at food that they can't eat! The Bubba Gump people were very nice though, so I forgive them.

Niceness is important. Three years ago, I invested a large chunk of my savings in a restaurant/bar. It has been a very bumpy ride, but the experience has taught me a lot about business. One of the lessons I learned is that customer service is king, and I got reminded of it again here. Many of the bloggers raved about Bubba Gump and La Maison's friendly staff. At the opposite end of the spectrum, Cabalen got negative publicity thanks to its rude and grumpy manager. Ouch. Someone needs to be fired.

What else do I have to say about the food tour? Oh yeah, I won a box of Krispy Kreme donuts in a raffle. Yay! Ate three that night and couldn't sleep until 7 AM... longest sugar high ever. I spent most of the tour with some kids from UP: Hello Kitty girl Tiffy, her sister Thea, two-time Palanca Award winner Hannah (Yes, two Palancas... and she's only 16! I told her to quit school), hungry guy Don, and Hello Kitty guy Bong. I also got to chat briefly with Jeff and Lalon and said hi to Shari, Benj, and Karlo.

Whoa, so many links. Might as well squeeze in one more huh. This is unrelated to the food tour, but... has anyone noticed anything different about our little shoutbox over there? Anyone? Paolo Mendoza paid to have it upgraded. Now it has all kinds of awesome features that I don't know about. Yay! Thanks, Paolo. You can have Jessica Alba when the Chicken Mafia takes over the world.

For the rest of you, Jessica Biel is still up for grabs, so... give us money now! Free food works too.