Eating, Drinking, Running?

I went to the Power Hour at the Corcoran Gallery this evening with ML and some of his friends. Basically, it is two glasses of wine, along with a combination cheese and hors d'oeuvres platter, and admission to the museum which had a Richard Avedon: Portraits of Power exhibit. The food, wine and company were great. The exhibit was interesting. It was weird seeing all these people from the 1970s who were in power then and who are still around in one capacity or another now. I wonder if they knew back then of the road they were embarking on. What was also interesting was he took a photo of then-state senator Barack Obama circa 2004. Talk about wondering about the road he was about to embark on....

Well, I'm headed to Texas to run a half. Hopefully I'll finish under 2:25:00 but I'm not convinced considering I haven't run in two weeks. This will be an interesting half.

Election Day!

It's election day. I voted. Hopefully, my candidate will win and then my presidential bad luck will finally end!!!!!

How far will I run for a Tiffany's Keychain?

The answer is: 13.1 miles -- or actually 14.12, as was the case this morning. I did the Virtual San Francisco Half Marathon -- basically you run a half marathon anywhere and record it with the Nike Plus band. For your troubles, you get a finisher's shirt and Tiffany keychain (via the mail). Using my Nike Plus, I ran 14.12 miles. I wasn't sure if the Nike Plus was accurately recording the distance (yes, I have a weird distrust of using technology while I run). Lately, it's been saying a run faster than I think I actually am, so I padded the run, just in case. Turns out time wise it was typically what I run for a half -- actually a little more. Starting at the apartment, I ran past the National Cathedral, down Mass Ave to R street, took R to 16th Street, made a right and ran to the White House where I made a left to 15th and then down to the mall which I lapped almost 2 times and then ran to 13th and F where I caught the metro back home. It wasn't too bad, all in all. I logged my run on the website. It's been a fairly active weekend. Now I only have the San Antonio Half and a barnburner run. But first, pumpkin soup!

Biking Hell

This Saturday I went to the Shenandoah Fall Foliage Bike Festival in Staunton, VA, birthplace of Woodrow Wilson. I went on a 34.4 mile bike ride -- which was described as gently rolling hills. I feel like Charlie Brown and Lucy with the football. I stupidly believe that the hills really a gently rolling -- to me that means not very steep and not that many. The course was hilly -- steep hills or long low grade hills. The last 5 miles, I pretty much had to walk up all the hills because me legs couldn't take any more! Still, the scenery was beautiful. Incidently, what the photo doesn't show it the 50 foot dip between the two hill tops or the wind that seemed to kick up every time I had to go uphill. It was freezing. Next time, I'm going to bring gloves.

Staunton, VA did have a very cool drive-in -- Wright's Dairy-rite. It was very 1950s with curbside service. Loved it and had a very nice chocolate shake to boot.



YUMMY!

Running, Running and More Running

The last weekend of September I went up to the Hamptons with Michelle and Michelle for the Hamptons Half Marathon. We rented a cute little cottage in Sag Harbor and drove around the different Hamptons (west, south and east). Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate. It poured the morning of the run! Still, a-running I went. It wasn't too bad -- there were moments where the rain stopped. But towards the end, I noticed some white stuff on the knee of my running pants. It was curious because I hadn't gone through any fields of white fluffy stuff -- turns out it was suds! I think when I do my laundry, rinsing twice might be a good thing. Still finishing was fun -- and I still managed it in under 2:30. And afterwards I celebrated with some good seafood -- the best fish I'd had at a place called Cherrystone's, beer, wine and chocolate. Let's face it, that's why I run.

I have another race this weekend. It's a virtual half, but I haven't been training as much as I should be. I'm beginning to get tired of all the running. Cross-training is something I really need to start doing.

chard

I've always wanted to try chard and finally at the farmers market I bought some this weekend. Dark green leaves with pink veins leading to the pink stem. Well, I learned you cook the stem and leaves separately and that's what I did. The leaves were cooked down with some oil, garlic, salt and pepper. The stems I chopped up and parboiled. After that I tossed with some olive oil, covered in parmesan cheese and baked. Not surprisingly, I liked the baked dish better. It was a nice meal after my 6 mile run.

Running and Burgers

I'm preparing for the Hamptons Half Marathon next weekend. My training schedule has been a bit off due to my vacation, but I've started up again -- on Monday it was 3 miles, today I ran outside for 46 minutes. I'm slowly building up time. Still, my back has been acting up. I'm thinking of doing something like acupuncture to deal with the pain or maybe pilates to help strengthen my back muscles. We'll see.

Last night I went to Good Stuff Eatery again. I had the fries, declined on the shake, and tried the Barn Buger which has pickled radish, carrots and cilantro for an asian theme. It was interesting, but frankly there is something wrong about a carrot on a burger.

Holiday's Over or What I Did Over Summer Vacation

Two weeks off from work went by quite quickly. I feel like I spent a lot of time in airports (of which the Singapore airport is officially my favorite airport ever) but it was a nice trip to Seoul, Singapore and Bangkok. Didn't do much running and frankly my training schedule is off, but did do a lot of walking -- granted to various food places. 

The food in Singapore and Bangkok was great! Stephanie's friend Adrian took us Americans to a great Malaysian hole in the wall restaurant. The food was cheap, spicy and YUMMY! We basically went up to the counter and pointed out things you wanted to try -- typically you could get about 3 or 4 of the dishes that the people would put on a plate of rice -- curries, stir-fires, fish balls, this really spicy tofu and potato dish that I ordered because it didn't look spicy. Lesson: looks can be deceiving.  I also tried chicken rice which is apparently famous in Singapore -- rice cooked in chicken broth and served with cooked chicken and some greens. And a trip to Singapore would not be complete if I didn't go to the Hawker market -- I went to Maxwell Road Hawker market in Chinatown where steamed buns, curry rice, chicken rice, sugar cane juice and other tasty treats awaited. 

I just wish the camera battery had not died, otherwise you'd see all the things I ate -- perhaps this is actually a good thing.

The one thing that I didn't get to try was Mister Donut's Tofu donut in Seoul. We walked past the sign on our way to dinner. I had hoped to go back and try it for dessert but that didn't work out. Later I tried to find the shop again but was unsuccessful. Next time!

I did check out Singapore's Asian Civilisations museum. In the China exhibit there different words or theme highlighted -- one of which is filial piety. I got a kick out of it because -- let's face it -- I tend to follow the opposite!

Travel and Food

Travel and Food are two things I love and I think that will be the focus of this blog. Where I eat and where go to explore. Well, at least that's one thing I can cross off my to do list.

My First Post

I thought I would try blogging.  I don't know what I'll be writing about or how often, but the time has come.