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Being away for a week and then out of commission due to covid for another week plus after that means that I'm slightly confused it's November, feeling out of step with time. I mean, that's felt like the new normal for almost five years now? *shrug* We skipped Halloween because neither of us was up for fighting crowds to get last-minute candy on October 31, but at least our next-door neighbors decided to spread the quirky internet potato love to our neighborhood.

Getting back into the swing of things meant choir for the first time in three weeks, first rehearsal with our brand-new orchestral conductor. Overall, I think things went pretty well, but we have got to get our noses out of the scores because there were a couple of movements where he is clearly conducting for a faster tempo than we are keeping up with, heh. I need to email the sopranos about "seriously, we know this better than we think, EYES ON KEDRICK PLZ," and it makes me understand conductors in other choirs that were just like "nope, we are doing this concert sans scores because at least your eyes will be glued to my baton," hahaha. Carmina Burana next Friday, November 8, at the Paramount, for anyone local to the Bay Area :)

Likewise, making it to coffee ride for the first time in a month this morning. Out the door before sunrise, biking with friends through West Oakland to Proyecto Diaz, mazapán latte and a pumpkin mole tamale on the (giant!) patio. They keep improving their outdoor space - there are now *swings* there, and it's an easy ride up the Mandela Parkway, only a couple of blocks from Raimondi Park where the Ballers play. (Instagram has been the opposite of subtle re encouraging us to pick up season tickets for next year; I expect our Facebook ads to be full of this by the end of the weekend.)

I do need to get in a run or two this weekend, and probably two more next week, just to re-establish lung function dependability; I'm running the Pacific Grove 5K Saturday morning. Hopefully it should be relatively cool - not as cold as when I was running in New York, but a morning run along the coast in the high 40s/low 50s should feel comfortable. Maybe spend the afternoon at the aquarium, then head over to Mezzaluna to carbo load hyounpark for his corresponding half-marathon on Sunday. My Sunday plan is to sit on the patio at Alta at the 1 mile mark of his race. Eat a yummy breakfast and debate between the maple peppercorn latte and the passionfruit-jasmine mimosa and devour whatever book I end up bringing with me and then meander down to the finish line and stuff H full of bananas and recovery drinks. Stop by Elroy's on our way to the highway, and then make our way back up the coast, hopefully before the traffic gets too bad. (And when it does, usually by Union City, we'll hop off and go to Jollibee. :D )

Just trying to ignore that there's an - as always now, consequential - election between now and then. And that we have 300 pages of reading to do this weekend to be relatively informed for the downballot races and propositions on said ballot, sigh. At least there's new Vienna Teng music getting us through it?

I was talking with a friend about fairs yesterday, and now I'm both sad I'll be missing out on the Big E (because even though I'll be in New England next week, I'm flying home the day it starts), and enthusiastically making grandiose plans with said friend to go to the Minnesota State Fair Great Minnesota Get-Together next year, despite neither of us living in the Midwest.

I didn't grow up going to fairs; they were the province of children's fiction to me. All I knew about fairs was that there would be fried foods and thrill rides of questionable safety and contests ranging from biggest pumpkin to fattest pig to who could eat a whole pie the fastest; thanks, EB White. So when Scott basically dragged half our dorm to the Eastern States Exposition my freshman year, well, I fell in love.

Every time I went, we'd spend the majority of our time eating our way through the State Houses. Comparing clam chowders between Massachusetts and Rhode Island, comparing lobster rolls between Maine and Connecticut, eating all the maple sugar candy from Vermont, blueberry everything and loaded baked potatoes from Maine, the Finnish pancakes from Massachusetts, frozen lemonade from Rhode Island to wash it all down, along with cider and cider donuts and fried dough and kettle corn and fudge everywhere. (And of course, apple pie with cheese!) I don't think I could do a full 12 hour day there anymore, but when we went back in college and postgrad, we spread all of that eating across the entire day, and that gave us time to digest enough to go on spinny rides and not barf :)

Fast forward more than a decade since the last time I managed to make it out to Western Mass during the Big E, and the algorithm keeps showing me fair food from the Minnesota State Fair, the most recent post from Molly Yeh included. Even though my phone hasn't left the state of California since May, and the last time it was in Minnesota was over five years ago when we visited the SPAM Museum on our way across the country.

I strongly suspect it's because there was a week in August where everybody was talking ALL HOTDISHES ALL THE TIME. I knew about hotdish before that; I did date a Minnesotan, after all, and then Molly Yeh brought them into the broader cultural consciousness (at least in my foodie circles). There's even the Hot Dash in March every year where there's a hotdish festival at the finish line!

So now there's been an even more mainstream Hotdish Revival, thanks Tim Walz. Even if the ones I'm finding more intriguing are, like, Samosa Chaatdish. Or Little Moga-Hot-Dishu. Or Molly's Chinese Hotdish. Or this Tater Tot Hotdish Bowl with kimchi and bossam, though of course if I were going to turn it back into a proper hotdish of course there would be rice involved. Or Hot Tot Berbere Tater Dishinator (scroll down to Keith Ellison's contribution). Though I am not yet seeing a Filipino-inspired hotdish, peeps, does this mean I have to figure one out myself? Or a Hmong Hotdish, from Yia Vang of Union Hmong Kitchen and Vinai.

Which brings me back to drooling over the New Foods List for the fair, burnishing its reputation every year, best known for how over-the-top chefs go to make the most delicious, talked-about fair food item. I'm looking at you, "smoked sausage slices wrapped in bacon, filled with cream cheese and drizzled with barbecue sauce," the kettle-chip ice cream sandwich, the sweet corn cola float. But I'm also delighted to see:

• Union Hmong Kitchen's mov nplaum ntshaav (Hmong grilled purple rice) with nqaj nyuj qhaa (traditional shredded beef) on a stick (the real spirit of fair food) from the aforementioned Yia Vang


• the native fusion manoomin and nixtamal with wóžapi and bison meatballs (you've got Ojibwe, Lakota, and Mesoamerican influences in one dish)


• the bánh mi and lobster roll éclairs (I'm wondering how well choux pastry stands up to the heft I usually associate with their respective sandwiches)

And lutefisk bao?! I will bring my empty stomach and a Game Plan next year, Minnesota!

I started out 2024 with my first-ever 5k, thanks to friends who persuaded me I didn't have to run if I didn't want to; we would just walk one together, and chat, and then drink hot chocolate and go home with cute jackets. That went well enough that I then fell into a pattern of doing monthly races with friends - the Chinatown 5k in February, the Oakland Marathon 5k in March, and then the Cherry Blossom virtual race in April because there wasn't a local race I was interested in for that month.

And then I got sick right after the Cherry Blossom race and fell off the calendar. May was basically a wash; I missed both the San Jose 8k and the Presidio 5k in June that my friends were doing. But next up: the San Francisco Marathon at the end of July, so I signed up for the Saturday 5k while hyounpark signed up for the Sunday half marathon. And in the meantime, I started actually working on a vaguely Couch to 5k plan, tested out various interval combinations, and resolved to try that for my race.

It was foggy and chilly and on the borderline between mist and drizzle, but it was lovely to be out somewhere pretty. I'm on the slower side; I finished in the last 20% of racers. But I also got to see a lot of cute dogs, and play encouraging auntie-type to a lot of kids racing with their parents. And there were definitely a few other racers doing a very similar interval pattern to me, where we kept passing each other and then catching up to each other, so it made me feel more reassured that I wasn't "doing it wrong," thank you anxiety brain.

( There were some hiccups. )

But they had portapotties reasonably close to the start/finish line, the volunteers handing out the water were friendly and efficient and encouraging, and I was mostly able to stick to my plan and feel accomplished but not totally gassed at the end.

Consider this foreshadowing for our experience of the half marathon the next day.

( the night before )

( the day of, first set of flusterclucks )

( the day of, things get better, featuring THE BEST FRIED POTATOES I HAVE EVER HAD IN MY LIFE )

( the day of, second set of flusterclucks )

Moral of the story? I am even more grateful that my first 5k got to be such a smoothly-run, professional experience, thanks to the reassuring competency of the Hot Chocolate Run organizers. That made me feel encouraged to keep going, accomplished for having taken the first step, instead of a slow-ass reject who wasn't worth making sure there'd be food for post-race when it had been advertised. That they had the sense to give us all of our swag at the expo the day before except for the food and medals, or even mail it to us beforehand, rather than try to distribute it amidst the pandemonium of the finish line. That THEY BELIEVED IN SUFFICIENT SIGNAGE.

(This is also why H never got his Bay to Breakers shirt, either, the finish line chaos there wasn't quite as bad, but the shirt line was an hour long, and who wants to stand around waiting in line for another hour after you've been running for two hours? Makes me suspect they under-order on the swag you paid extra for.

In addition, I earned a "challenge medal" by doing both Oakland and San Francisco this year, and so did Hyoun, and said medals hadn't arrived for distribution in time, so we need to email the organizers about getting them mailed to us tomorrow. And I figure we might as well ask about him getting his jacket sent as well, given ALL OF THE ABOVE. But I've also found out that the same people who run the San Francisco Marathon are the same people who run the Berkeley Half, so I am Really Not Sure I want to give these people my money again even for a 5k. Which makes me sad, because that's probably my closest actually-local race. At least the Giant Race I'm doing with friends in a few weeks has different management, so we'll see how well that's run? And maybe I'll find an orange tutu to wear for it?

And now? Today was a 19,000 step day on the day I wasn't even running a race, yesterday was a 14,000 step day with my 5k, and I have been up for almost 21 hours. So to quote the sagacious Mr. Samuel L Jackson, I am now GOING THE FUCK TO SLEEP.

So relieved the rain cleared up in time for the Lunar New Year 5K hyounpark and I did this morning in Chinatown!

I know, what, these words coming out of my mouth? But bike friends convinced me to sign up for the Hot Chocolate 5K in January, and I figured that was manageable, a one-time thing with friends and chocolate and a nice jacket for swag, and also Golden Gate Park makes for a pretty course. Then Rachel persuaded me to come out for a 7K in my town in February because community ties and meeting your neighbors and climbing my second of the four big hills in our town (Cutting and Moeser down, Barrett and Potrero to go) and cute bandanas. And then I told Hyoun we were doing the LNY 5K because the tech tees had dragons and also I needed cute long-sleeve exercise tops. His reaction: “YOU’RE FINALLY COMING AROUND AND IT ONLY TOOK 18.5 YEARS! 😍😍😍”

And now the Oakland 5K is in two weeks … which is kind of establishing a pattern of me averaging a 5k every month? Um. Lesson learned: make the swag cute enough and I’ll fall for it. (I know, I know, pukajenhas been priming this pump for years, too, as a friend and Orca Running ambassador ;) ) (Original post.)