Friday, June 27, 2008

first 5K this decade

In elementary school and junior high I was forced to run on a daily basis. I was pretty bad compared to the rest of my class (best mile: 8:32, best 3 mile: 28+; both times among the last five finishers) and so I grew to hate running.

Nowadays I run on a treadmill at least once a week for 4+ miles, but for some reason the idea of running outside is still a little outside my comfort zone.

Last week, the gym at work was advertising a 5K fun run with T-shirts and prizes, and I told myself that if I could get someone else to run with me, I'd sign up. Several people that I talked to all signed up, so I did too. And I ran.

I finished in 29:27, making me 74th out of 127th, about which I'm quite pleased. I guess my standards are lower now.

After spinning class that afternoon where I biked another 17K or so, I treated myself to dinner at Old Port Lobster Shack. I ate an entire lobster roll (plus coleslaw, plus chips), and probably 8 or 9 Rhode Island mid-neck clams. Yum!

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

recent eatings

I haven't talked about food for maybe a whole post! Or not. Anyway, there were a couple recent restaurant outings possibly worth mentioning, so I'll mention them.

A couple weeks ago, during the second Dine About Town this year (are there usually two?), I went with some friends to One Market.

The DaT menu included:

Spring Vegetable Salad (banyuls vinaigrette)
- or -
Black Bean Soup (salt & pepper calamari, cilantro, lime)

Braised Berkshire Pork Short Ribs (butter beans, chorizo)
- or -
White Poppyseed-Crusted Skatewing (wild arugula, niçoise olives, herb vinaigrette)

Fresh Strawberry and Grand Marnier Trifle
- or -
Peach Brown Butter Tart

I chose the salad, the short ribs, and the trifle. The salad was pretty good, with lots of green beans and such, but I thought the black bean soup was actually more interesting; it was so thick it was almost like a puree. I stole several spoonfuls of soup from other people at my table.

The pork ribs were good, but unspectacular, I thought, and of course I didn't try the skatewing. Those who did said it was so-so. One person chose off the regular menu, and his Roasted Liberty Farms Duck Breast was excellent.

We all picked the strawberry trifle for dessert, so I didn't have a chance to try the peach tart, but I didn't really care, because the trifle was really good; crispy sweet strawberries, hardly any custard/cream at all, with just enough sweetness in the shortbread. I ate the entire cup in about a minute, and got made fun of for several minutes afterwards.

Overall I thought the food was generally well executed, and worth the price ($32 for 3 courses), but there was no one dish that blew me away. I may go back sometime, but I don't think I'll go out of my way to do so in the near future.

I also recently went to afternoon tea at The Rotunda, on the top floor of the Neiman Marcus in Union Square. I was unimpressed with the tea; after we ordered, we were brought teapots of hot water and bags of Mighty Leaf. I am fond of Mighty Leaf and drink it on a regular basis, but I guess I expected loose leaf tea. Plus, they were out of the flavor my mom wanted, the White Lotus, although she did enjoy the White Orchard that she got instead.

I was pretty happy with the food; the finger sandwiches were fine (hard to get wrong, I suppose), the scones were light and flaky, and the cookies and tarts were yummy (my sister especially liked the crumb cake), although a few of them were a little too sweet. The portions were generous, and we ended up taking home enough to eat for breakfast the next day. I'm glad we went because it was a nice experience sitting under the Rotunda and I've been wanting to check it out for awhile, but I think I prefer the teas at the Ritz or the Palace, and I definitely preferred the tea I had last month in New Orleans at Le Salon. Mmm, caviar.

Monday, June 23, 2008

should schedule downtime?

I think I may need to schedule more downtime on weekends. Otherwise, I'm inevitably falling asleep by mid-afternoon on Mondays. It's just so hard for me to say no to fun things.

Last weekend was a really good mix of events. Friday night was the annual Oakland A's luxury box outing. It's always fun chilling in a box, but this was actually a good game, too; it ran into 11 innings before the A's pulled it out with a walkoff double by Suzuki, who was 4-5 with a homer and 5 RBIs overall. The guys in the neighboring suites were really drunk and pretty entertaining, too.

Saturday was pretty chill during the day (bunch of errands plus yummy Chinese breakfast at China Bee, in downtown San Mateo). After dinner, we headed to a going-away party at Music Tunnel. It seems like we end up there about once every quarter, even though it's at least 45 minutes away. This time, because we had 15 people, we got the "Super VIP" room, where we stayed for five-and-a-half hours; slightly longer than usual.

I was in bed by 4am on Saturday but still didn't get up until nearly 11:30am the next morning, making me ten minutes late for basketball practice. From there it was a mad dash to get showered and changed for a 1-year-old's birthday party. I'm not sure if he understood that it was his birthday or not, but the rest of us had a great time, eating lots of yummy BBQ and homemade dessert, and then playing a couple games of Mafia.

So if I were really trying to do this whole downtime thing properly, I would have to figure out which of the following events to turn down for next weekend: a poolside BBQ Friday night at a coworker's gorgeous place in Atherton (they have a pool house the size of a small apartment), a going-away party later that night at a San Francisco lounge I've been wanting to check out all year, or a Sunday afternoon birthday party for a friend I haven't seen in forever. (Saturday is untouchable; I'm going to an amazing Japanese restaurant in the city, and then hosting a casino night birthday party in the evening. I've already decided to ditch a matinee showing of Wall-E.) What to do, what to do...

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Hairspray

Last week I went to see Hairspray, which was amusing and well done, although not my favorite type of musical. I do wish they had found a better dancer to play Tracy, since the entire plot hinges on her dancing ability. She just seemed lacking in energy, especially compared to the actors playing Link and Seaweed, both of whom were excellent. Of course, the guy playing Link also looked like he was about eighteen years old, so it was probably less of an effort for him.

Monday, June 16, 2008

snapshot in time

Some relatives came to visit my parents' house last weekend. When I was showing them my old room, one of them commented that it looked like a boy's room, which made me take a closer look.

I was obsessed with teal back then, so the curtains are a light blue-green. There are four posters on the wall; two "San Francisco 49ers Super Bowl Champions" posters, one San Jose Sharks poster (featuring Arturs Irbe, Sergei Makarov, & Igor Larinov), and one Pokemon poster circa 1995. There is also a blue-and-white cat latch hooking, framed and hung. There are stacks and stacks of books, mostly fantasy and young adult fiction, and there is a CD rack full of mid-90's hip hop. The furniture is dark brown and the walls are white.

I'm a little bewildered. Does the lack of anything pink and frilly suggest a male occupant, maybe?

Friday, June 13, 2008

foil-covered workspace



...aka what happens at work on a Friday around 6 or 7pm after a bunch of us have drunk most of a keg and gorged ourselves on homemade-from-scratch Rocky Road Chocolate Fudge ice cream cake.

kickball time!

We played kickball today at work, frontend vs backend. Frontend won after a very exciting last inning in which the score went from 20-10 to 20-19, so we took home the rest of the keg.

I haven't played kickball since...maybe college? But, I kicked two singles (one because someone dropped the ball) and managed to score two runs (with much help from the first and third base coaches). Yay me.

Another cool thing; I was standing outside for nearly two hours in the grass and wasn't one bit allergic, which I guess is another sign that spring is over and summer is here. Too bad I hate hot weather almost as much as allergies.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

stop calling me

I just want to listen to music, damnit.

Someone from the "Friends of the SF Symphony" called me on my cell phone yesterday, while I was at work. The conversation went something like this.

her:I'm calling from the Friends of the SF Symphony. Do you have a minute?
me:No, I'm at work.
her:Is this a cell phone? Let me make a note...when can I call you back?
me:What's this about?
her:I thought you wanted to get off the phone.
me:Can't you tell me in one sentence what this is about?
her:What about between 5pm and 9pm?
me:Exactly what are you calling about?
her:How about Saturday?
me:I'd like to know what you're calling about. Is this about tickets?
her:No, I'm calling from the Friends of the SF Symphony, we help keep music in schools.
me:I'm not interested, please take me off of your list.

The caller hung up all huffy. I think I must have gotten on her list because I bought some tickets to the symphony last year. I hate that this happens. Is there no way that I can buy symphony tickets and not have to deal with this kind of crap?

On a somewhat related note, someone named Gina Papan keeps sending junk mail to my house. I think she's running for some kind of office. If I ever see her name on a ballot I'm going to vote against her just because of all the trees she's killed. I wish there was a box on the voter registration form for "decline to state party affiliation and don't send me junk mail, either".

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

one book, $188.28

I just spent $188.28 for a book, which I know sounds ridiculous, but, well, there's a long story.

As a small child I really loved Madeleine L'Engle's Time Quartet (A Wrinkle in Time, etc., now considered a quintet, with An Acceptable Time), as well as her Vicky Austin books. Later on I discovered some of her "adult" fiction, and particularly enjoyed A Severed Wasp, A Live Coal in the Sea, and Certain Women, among others. I eventually read every one of L'Engle's non-religious books, except one. The last book, called Ilsa, was published in 1946, and has never been reprinted, due (at least in part) to the author's dissatisfaction with her own work.

Initially I didn't think this was a problem; I figured I could borrow the book from a library or something. When the Novato Library was unable to get the book, I figured their network was too small. A couple years later, I went to college, and tried again using MIT's Interlibrary Loan service. Still no dice. After that, I started to look for the book online. This was sometime in early 1997. Over the next few years I tried AbeBooks, BookFinder, Alibris, Powell's, Biblio, Amazon Rare Books and more. Finally, sometime in 2002, I gave up on everything else and pinned my hopes on eBay.

The thing about eBay was that every so often, a copy of Ilsa would surface. The problem was that it would generally sell for around $400, and I wasn't willing to pay that much for a book that I just wanted to read, not collect! Anyway, I set up an eBay alert, and waited. Between 2002 and 2008, I think I probably was notified about 10 or 15 times, and every time but one, the book sold for over $250. One time, about 2-3 years ago, a copy sold for around $185; I forgot to check the auction on the last day, and kicked myself for a week afterwards.

Madeleine L'Engle passed away late last year, which made me sad, but it also made me afraid that her death would drive up the price of Ilsa and make it impossible to buy. Yeah, I'm terrible. Alternatively, I thought perhaps the book would finally be reprinted, but it's been nearly a year, and I haven't heard anything yet.

Anyway, two weeks ago, a copy went on sale with no reserve price, so I bid $20 to remind myself to bid again later. I had dinner plans on the night that the auction ended, so I spent about twenty minutes debating a price and finally bid $212 before heading out. I was so used to losing these auctions that it was a surprise and a relief to discover that I had won the book for the low low price of $188.28. So, just a decade and a half after starting to look for it, I have my book. This morning, I cancelled my six-year-old eBay alert. I'm tempted to photocopy the whole thing and email it to myself, just in case.

Saturday, June 07, 2008

rosemary potatoes

I've realized recently that different types of potatoes have significantly different tastes. My favorite are the Yukon Gold potatoes, but I've recently been using red round and fingerling potatoes as well. Because I have a big rosemary bush in my backyard, I just saute the potatoes with salt, pepper, and rosemary, and they usually turn out pretty well.

Friday, June 06, 2008

the internet is broken

Amazon.com is down. It makes me feel strangely uneasy.

Wednesday, June 04, 2008

10 for 12

Yesterday I realized that at the end of this year, I will have been on an airplane at least once every month except June and October.

 

This is my personal blog. The views expressed on these pages are mine alone and not that of my employer.