just chillin’…

It was a warm and sunny weekend in SF and we had a good time hanging out at home with the windows open.   I must be somewhat rested because this morning I woke up at 5:55 am without the alarm and I was wide awake.  Too bad this had to go to waste because I have the day off today!!  Wooo!

Here’s the weekend roundup:

On Saturday, I got up early to go for a run.  I’m trying to break in my new running shoes before next weekend’s race and it’s been giving me some problems.  My left foot starts to fall asleep after about 2 miles of running.  Not good.  So, I stopped at 3 miles and it happened to be at the Farmer’s Market where I picked up a bunch of dahlias.  Aw…so purty.

For lunch that day, we drove 45 minutes to Liou’s House in Milpitas to meet up with some friends to have this elusive soup called Buddha Jump Over the Wall.  This soup takes a day to prepare (you have to call ahead to order) and it’s made with a bunch of stuff like shark fin, abalone, and other stuff that I didn’t recognize.  Regardless, it was pretty good but I’m not sure that if I were Buddha that it would make me want to “jump over the wall” to have meat.  Apparently that’s why it’s named that.  We also had a grip of other items for the 10 of us to share around the table and poor Jes had to drive home with food coma.

On Sunday, I went for another run in the morning – it sucked again.  Then around noon, I went out for ANOTHER run but just threw in some hills to see if it would make the buzzing in my left foot go away.  Nope.  No luck.  Hm…what to do?  I may have to run the half marathon next weekend in my old shoes.

Afterward, I decided to treat myself to some mango sticky rice.  On our way home from lunch Saturday, we stopped at 99 Ranch and got some ripe juicy mangoes.  So I whipped up my momma’s coconut rice recipe and that’s basically what we had for lunch.

At 5 pm, we headed over to Pete’s to watch the Lakers get whooped by the Celtics.  It was a sad sad evening for us.  We’ll be back for Game 3 on Tuesday but it’s not looking good for us if RayRay keeps making 3’s and Kobe has another off day.

Stay-cation Accomplished

I had a fantastic 3-day weekend.  As part of our stay-cation, we visited de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park on Sunday.  They have a special exhibition called “Birth of Impressionism” featuring paintings by Monet, Renoir, and Degas.  They were paintings borrowed from the famous Musee d’Orsay in Paris so it was as if Paris had visited me this weekend. In September they’ll be continuing it with works by Cezanne and Van Gogh so we got an individual membership, which will cover both visits at a discount.  Anyone wanna go to the Legion of Honor/Palace of Fine Arts with me?  I can get into that museum and bring a guest with me for free!

We also went up to the top of the tower of the museum (9 floors above the park) for a spectacular 360-degree view of the park and the city.

We were blessed with some really nice weather and got to take a nice stroll in the park to see the turtles in the pond people swing dancing out by the bridge.

Afterward, we stopped at San Tung for lunch and got some tasty tasty spicy crispy chicken wings and dumplings.  Yum.

On Monday, I got in a 3-mile run and came home to a spam and eggs breakfast.  We spent the rest of the day lounging around at home watching all the episodes of a short-lived sci-fi show called “Firefly”, made some lasagna for us to eat this week, and managed to get in spurts of cleaning.

For dinner, we grilled some chicken wings and corn out in the pool area.  The Masayas even joined us.  With the house clean, the laundry done and folded, and lunch packed for tomorrow, I feel ready to go to work for my 4-day work week.  Having a vacation at home is not bad.

I’m in the mood for jello…

On Saturday morning, we took Koa to Fort Funston. Koa had a great time and as Jes said on our way back to the car, it was “nice and very restorative” for the both of us. I’m so relieved to actually have Memorial Day off this year.  I was in need a good “stay-cation” and it’s starting off well.

Later in the evening, we met up with the Masayas for an evening of Lakers Basketball at the usual place and in the usual seats.  We sat in the corner that we took over last season when the Lakers won the Championship.  Must have been good luck for us because the Lakers had to squeak out a win after going into the 4th quarter leading by 17 points.  By the last minute and a half of game play “the game [was] in the fridge: the door [was] closed, the lights [were] out, the eggs [were] cooling, the butter [was] getting hard, and the Jell-O [was] jigglin'”.  Ah…I miss the days of Chick Hearn.

Rockstar on Tour

Our friend Joel was on a 7-week tour around the country and his 3rd to last stop was San Francisco.  So, we went out on Wednesday night to watch him play.  It was at the Regency Ballroom where it was filled with lots of early-20-somethings ready to party.  I, on the other hand, was ready to shoot some photos of Joel and the band but had to check my camera at the coat check because it looked “professional”.  Bummer.  Next time I’ll have to ask him for a press pass or something.

Everest – Joel is the guitarist on the far right.

So, I got this photo (above) with my trusty iPhone and then later got my camera back to take a group photo by the bar.

Everest came out with a new album a couple weeks ago so we bought a copy directly from them (to maximize their profit) and a couple t-shirts too.  Sounds like one of their new songs is being played in LA on KROQ.  That’s cool.  Good luck with the new album, Joel!

Wind and Waves

On Saturday, Jes and I drove to Richmond to meet up with a lady that Jes has gone sailing with in the past.  She owns a 36-foot sailboat and invites people to crew for her.  Jes has gone out before and asked if I could come along too some day.  Well, this was the weekend and it happened to be extra windy and the bay was on a high surf advisory outside of the Golden Gate Bridge.  Fortunately for us, we stayed in the bay but it was still really choppy and windy.  We sailed around Angel Island past Sausalito, past the GG Bridge and the city skyline, and back up past Treasure Island.  I had a great time and felt pretty good for most of the trip.

It was all good until it was time to pee below deck.  The sailboat had a toilet so I went down to check it out.  As the lady was showing me how to flush the toilet, I had a sudden rush of puke come up, and I ended up yacking in the toilet.  Once I did that, I felt great!  And I still had to pee.  So, the trip was over.  They brought down the sails and turned on the motor for a quick ride back to the harbor.  Jesse thinks I got sick from going below deck.  Even he has a tendency to get disoriented down there.  Oh well.  A girl had to pee after 3 hours on the water.

It’s starting to hurt.

(click image to see larger version)

I’m at the 10-mile mark of my Half Marathon training and this one was painful. I added a few hills and I got a twinge of pain in my right achilles and soleus muscle at about the 6-mile mark. Unfortunately, once you’re out there, the only way home is to run home or call the husband. I decided to run home and finished with a slower time (1:44) and had to give the old leg a good icing and Motrin. Luckily I’m up the next day without pain and just a little tightness. Only 3 more weeks until the Giants Race!