Veinte y siete de abril

April 27th is the new May 5th, in my book. Josh, Rudy, Lindsay, Anna, Kara, Nate and I BBQed it up. Kara came over first, around lunchtime, and we made delicious hamburgers for lunch. Despite Nate's nay saying, I ground the beef chuck myself, in the food processor. This is better from a food safety standpoint and I think it makes the meat taste fresher (I'm sure the latter is an artifact of my imagination). To give credit back where credit is due, Nate suggested including pickles and onions in the hamburger patties, so I threw a few spoonfuls of bread and butter pickles into the mix. The hamburgers were quite good, although a little overcooked, thanks to Kara and I's dawdling. The real star of the meal was the banana sauce and mayonnaise spread, which we slathered on our burgers. It was a great dip for the Tater Tots, too.

Banana sauce alone is a little boring (don't tell Nate), but added to mayo is a thing of beauty. It brings a little spice and a lot of sweetness and turns it an appealing pink. I first had this dip at the Spider House in Boracay with their magical meatloaf cum hamburger sandwich.

Later in the afternoon, we grilled up some carne asada on the replacement BBQ (which is now chained to the deck, to prevent another backyard robbery). This was my first attempt at marinating my own and I think it turned out well. It wasn't exactly like that of Super A Foods in Eagle Rock, but good in its own right. I drenched a fair amount of top sirloin slices in a mixture of sliced onions, garlic, key lime juice, orange juice, oil, cumin, and cayenne pepper. A few hours (and beers) later, we threw this on the grill and gobbled it down with some warm corn tortillas. And a great pineapple, cilantro, onion, avocado, and jalapeno salsa courtesy of Josh. And...a sugar snap, corn, and spinach salad with blue cheese dressing that would have been more interesting with real blue cheese.

Please sun, grace San Francisco with your presence for a few more weeks (or the whole summer if you're feeling particularly generous).

More badass than we knew

It turns out that we finished in 31:13:31! At 147th place (out of 250ish).

199 miles, 33 hours, no sleep

I did The Relay this weekend with 11 random people. We were trapped in a van for two days, running, eating, and not really sleeping. It's amazing what your body can do if you push it.

The following times are approximate:

12pm: cheeseburger and half a beer.

4pm: ran my first 5.5 mile leg. The wind was blowing so hard that it added 30 seconds to my pace and I felt like I was running backwards.

9pm: ate a roast beef sandwich for the first time ever and washed it down with tortellini soup and a chocolate Interlude (thanks Mac). Slept on the bench of a van for 1.5 hours, then woke up and brushed my teeth.

4am: ran 6.4 miles in the dark. Nearly hyperventilated from fear. Back on pace though, running away from imagined bad guys.

8am: half a Jimmy Dean sausage and egg sandwich, a blueberry bagel with cream cheese, apple juice, and a hard boiled egg (eaten whole on a dare from Alek). Slept 2 hours on a mat on a cold gym floor.

2pm: ran 6.2 miles on Highway 9 through little towns like Ben Lemond. Had some energy to sprint to my last handoff (I'll give the egg credit for that).

7pm: ate 2.5 tacos and half a plate of nachos at Las Palmas in Santa Cruz, washed down with a Pacifico.

9pm: nearly fell asleep on the way home to SF. Thanks for picking us up, Nate!

Balut

The bag o' balut.

A peek inside.

"Balut soup" down the hatch.

A wee little duck.

All done!


More Philippines pics to come...