time to get macho

as my new workout DVD idol says.

So after learning that I use Dancing with the Stars cardio DVDs when I want to exercise, Bunny lent me a few of the many DVDs in her house. She chose Core Rhythms, an exercise program that also uses Latin dancing to trim the waistline. Now this is what Dancing with the Stars could have been!

Julia and Anna... almost every Russian or Ukrainian girl I've ever known is named Julia
(sometimes Yulia) or Anna. The others are all Olgas.

After getting over the gaudy workout gear I grew to really appreciate Core Rhythms. I like the different camera angles - you can change it to view the workout from the front, the back (so you don't have to think too hard when they say left but move their right knee,) the "core" or the ab cam, and a split view of the front and core. I also like how they explain how you should be moving because it really helps with the form and technique. And I love their exclamations: "Flex that muscle! Show me your macho muscles!"

I'll try!

I found the first DVD, the quickstart, to be very easy. They taught you the 3 main moves of the entire program and helped you move around while doing hip flexions or lateral movements. But then I popped in the next DVD, the quick workout, and phew! I was sweating in almost no time. I know the challenge and change of workout is good as I am pretty accustomed to my other DVDs. But let me tell you, when Julia and Anna say that this is a quick workout, they mean that they move very quickly.

4 DVDs, 4 times the difficulty!

Something to watch: the "o" in Core Rhythms pulses to the beat of the music. Helps you stay on tempo.

tomato crazy

This beautiful pasta is so striking that not only did it get the front page of the summer pasta article in Martha Stewart Living, it also landed the cover of the magazine! Yes, only here is a food item treated like a supermodel.

My results look more like the cover page - it's really just a difference of pasta. Here's the interesting new shape I have yet to encounter...

Croxetti? I must get my hands on this newfangled coin-shaped pasta!

But with a few tweaks, I don't have to wait to make my version of the sauce. Martha lists heirloom tomatoes in a variety of colors, torn basil, lemon zest, garlic chips, capers, red pepper flakes, and your standard extra virgin olive oil for the delicious topper but I have plans of my own...

hmm, I probably should be drinking a little wine while I cook!

My substitutions:

• Regular red tomatoes instead of heirloom tomatoes because they're cheaper and my neighborhood greengrocer doesn't sell that yuppie crap. I do have two shapes (roma and beefsteak) to give a little variety in size and shape!
• Minced garlic instead of whole garlic cloves to be turned into garlic chips. They'll taste the same and pre-cut garlic is just easier!
• Kalamata olives instead of capers... I'm not against capers, I just prefer olives. Since they're both salty, I find the olives to be an ingenious alternate. Also, they were already in my refrigerator, so why not!

The basil, lemon zest, and extra virgin olive oil remain unchanged. And that red onion? That was included in the photo by accident but it is not in the recipe. The red onion will be used in another Martha Stewart recipe, to be executed later this week. And I forgot about the red pepper flakes until it was time to add them, but here they are!

Brown garlic in the extra virgin olive oil over LOW heat.
You do not want to be burning yourself with oil splatter.
Add red pepper flakes mid-way through (my idea!)

Delicious!

Chop the tomatoes into little wedges, tear up your basil, and halve the olives.
Toss!

see, not using the red onion!

Add lemon zest...

... and the browned garlic.
Toss again!

Boil water and cook your pasta.
I'm using pappardelle, a long flat noodle.
Follow the directions on the package for al dente...
the instructions are usually spot-on about that.

Toss pasta with the tomato mix...

et voila! Dinner is served!

Delicious and nutritious, and best of all, it tastes so FRESH!
Artichoke heart and Parmesan cheese optional.

Gazpacho, marinated tomato pasta... Mumsy bought a huge box of tomatoes and we need to come up with more ways to use 'em!

get inspired!

Tonight's episode of Showtime's The Franchise shed light on the hardworking and ever-smiling Andres Torres! The very same man who signed my sneakers!

Torres can never smile too much!
image from sacramento.cbslocal.com

Teammates Jeremy Affeldt and Mark Da Rosa say that he's the happiest guy on the team and greets everybody - ushers and all - every morning. How sweet is that?

And if his 2010 performance, his Willie Mays-like defense, and his affable personality weren't enough, here's another reason to love the other journeyman:

He's worked very hard to get where he is... if possible you must watch all of Episode 5 because this little video doesn't show even half of his story.

And yes, it doesn't hurt that he's fun to look at.

it feels so long ago

The last game I went to was on Sunday, July 10... it's just one day short of a calendar month!

The 59th consecutive sellout just happened to be the second ever Grateful Dead Day at AT&T Park... I would know because I went to the first one last year and got Buster Bunny at the Build-a-Bear workshop behind the bleachers. It just so happens that the August 9 date for Grateful Dead Night is the same as last year's, making today's game extra special as it was Buster Bunny's birthday!

Some memories of the night...

nice old Deadheads decked out in their finest tie-dye and mullets

Boudin's clam chowder... my bread bowl runneth over

Happy 1st birthday, Buster Bunny!
And get well soon, Buster Posey!

couldn't resist the garlic fries!

Panda stretches like a little kid... so cute!

Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Giants (1st or 3rd) base coach Tim Flannery
sing the National Anthem a cappella

the GREAT view from Section 311, Row 6.
Big thanks to Speedy for landing these tickets on stubhub.com!

As usual MG and I were imagining alternate careers for the visiting team... we found that a lot of the Pirates had, how do you say, unique eyes. But none scared me more than those of Pirates catcher Ryan Doumit:

alien eyes! They got me every time, especially after the 7th Inning Stretch!

I noticed that Bumgarner and Casilla would walk him... but I don't blame them. If an alien like this looked at me, I would let him pass. I don't want him to open his mouth and eat me with three tongues and five million fangs and shark teeth.

Mad Bum is phenomenal and tallies up 10 Ks on his own

Mickey Hart and a cool guy (I forgot! Sorry!) lead the crowd in
"Take Me Out to the Ballgame"

luchadore returns! I think I've seen him at almost every game this year!

none of the ushers try to stop him anymore!

Finally, after a long 8th inning and an even longer 9th inning where Santiago Casilla put the torture back in SF Giants baseball, we shut the Pirates out and won 6-0! Big props to homer-hitting Aubrey Huff, the hit parade that brought in 3 RBIs in one inning, and the delightful error on the Pirates' part. Huge congratulations to catcher Chris Stewart, who hit his very first Major League career home run tonight!

WIN!

Way to go, Giants!

road trip

Had to bake some chocolate chip cookies to sweeten the deal for Mumsy, who agreed to dog-sit Q-Tip for a night...

the foolproof bribe

Why? Because the girls went to Reno!

The drive up the mountains was quite enjoyable, though I am guilty of napping even though I was supposed to be co-pilot.

perhaps the home of Rainbow Brite?

driving along the Truckee River

just about 15 more minutes to Reno!

We felt the heat once we left the Bay Area but the desert-like terrain of Nevada only amplified the need to roll down the windows.

Pulled into the Grand Sierra Resort, which I found to have a good mix attractions and amenities:

cowboys and slot machines!

The view from our room was pretty nice...

the "beach."
Most of the area around the pool is covered in sand for a beachy effect.
Besides a pool with fun music you can hear through the windows on the 12th floor,
there's a sanded volleyball court, cabanas, and a hot tub.
Really? A hot tub in the summer?

On the right is a reservoir that offers driving ranges.
The parking lot behind the building is actually the resort's RV park!

There's also a small underground shopping area within the resort that offers outdated clothes, cheap sandwiches, a movie theatre, and a 50-lane bowling alley! Not bad!

Now we all know that the casinos along the Strip offer celebrity-chef restaurants but I think this humble watering hole in Reno can be proud of its Italian eatery, Briscola.

the pasta special of the night... artichokes, haricots verts, pine nuts, pesto,
and a few heirloom tomatoes tossed with flat pasta.
Sausage added because this pasta special is vegetarian.

But by far we got the most pleasure from people-watching at the lounge/club with a live band... some of the resort's guests were characters all their own!

On the left we have Spazzy from Minnesota. He was a mashup of the dance from
"Walk Like An Egyptian" and my old chihuahua having a seizure,
all without spilling a drop of his beer.
On the right is a solo dancer, an nice old man who was having the time of his life.
And in the center is Stripey, a 62 year-old grandma who alternated between dancing a mean jive
and taking dips in the "beach" pool in her bikini.
She is very proud of her bikini. You can see it through her cover-up.

The only thing that could have made our stay better would be seeing the fictional cops of Reno 911! in action. That and winning a hefty jackpot at the slots.

soup's on?

This isn't the first time I've made one of Martha's soups and I have a feeling it won't be the last! In contrast to the super-beefy stew I made last time, this soup is vegetarian - but you won't miss the meat!

Behold, Martha Stewart's "gazpacho" as featured in the August 2011 issue of Martha Stewart Living. Start with about 4 beefsteak tomatoes, half a fatty cucumber, and half an onion. Chop away!

I don't bother with the tomatoes but don't forget to peel your cucumbers!

Put everything in a blender and add some minced garlic, however much you like.

All gazpacho recipes call for sherry or sherry vinegar.
I improvised with a 2 tablespoons each of white vinegar and vermouth!
Also doubled the amount of olive oil Martha recommends! Used 4 tablespoons!
Add to blender...

Dry roast some almonds, about half a cup...

toasty!

Now cram EVERYTHING in the blender!
Give it a whirl...

You're not done yet! Stick it in the fridge for an hour or so.
Gazpacho is meant to be eaten chilled!

Finally!
Salt and pepper to taste...
I improvised once more and used salt & pepper potato chips.

Enjoy! This soup is great for a hot day (such as any day last week) and is an easy way to get your fruits (tomatoes) and veggies (cucumbers.) It's pretty tasty and simple... and as Mumsy pointed out, it's perfect to eat after a tooth extraction!

the force is strong with this one!

Today was the last day at work for a co-worker and good friend... she has decided to make a huge change and move to South Korea where she will teach and hopefully get a foothold in the communications industry. Since she was my first friend in the department, she will be missed.

But enough of that sappy stuff, we here planned a surprise ice cream social for the girl! I baked cookies to go with the ice cream, and not just any cookies...

party in a box!

Received these awesome cookie cutters as a gift last year. Williams-Sonoma should keep carrying these because these cookie cutters never fail to sell out. Now you too can use the force and chomp on Darth Vader, Boba Fett, and a flurry of Storm Troopers. I made one Yoda for the Goodbye Girl but I personally have a hard time eating something so cute, especially when it resembles one of my late dogs.

I know that Williams-Sonoma created a second set of cookie cutters but it showcased the spacecrafts from the movies. I don't know, I don't think eating a Millennium Falcon is as fun as taking a bite out of Darth Vader. Hopefully there will be another set with more characters... I'm thinking R2-D2, C3PO, an ewok, and Chewy!

back to what matters

the food!

We decided to try Seller's Market for lunch on Wednesday... Bunny, Speedy, and Snapshot got kobe beef salads and I picked the kobe beef "rock 'n' roll," a sandwich in a sourdough roll that's meant to be "eaten like a burrito..."

quite beefy

The beef was very tender, which is expected of kobe beef. But the extras - the peppers and onions - didn't seem to jive as well as they should with the beef. And there was a strong lemony-citrusy flavor in the roll, yet there was no mention of lemon in the menu. Very peculiar.

All in all, the sandwich was good but not worth $8.95. My co-workers said the same of their salads... alright but not worth $10.

a real tear-jerker

not since Dobby died have I been so saddened by a movie!

Never Let Me Go is based on the Kazuo Ishiguro novel of the same name and stars Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley, and Andrew Garfield in a parallel Britain where clones are created and raised for a morbidly nightmarish and shocking purpose: organ farms.

so sad...

Judging from the TV Guide summary, I had no idea that this movie was this sort of shocking dystopia. All I had to go on was a blurb akin to "three children in a seemingly idyllic boarding school are faced with a haunting reality." Naturally, I thought that the reality was growing up... unsurprisingly, I was knocked off my rocker! But after the initial shock when Miss Lucy discloses the children's fate - I missed the first five minutes of the movie which apparently is the first giveaway - I decided that this eerie twist added some gloom and goth to the familiar love triangle.

L to R: Carey Mulligan as Kathy, Keira Knightley as Ruth, and Andrew Garfield as Tommy

Also learned that Carey Mulligan did this project shortly after An Education... you can tell her stock just skyrocketed after these those two projects. For me, Keira and Andrew were good, just not nearly as brilliant as Carey.

What really amazes me is the casting choices for the first third of the movie, which documents the young childhood of the trio. Going only on looks, I feel like these girls were picked solely because they look so much like their adult counterparts. But these lasses have acting in their blood, too!

Ella Purnell (left) plays young Ruth while Isobel Meikle-Small nails the part of young Kathy

By the way, watching the first third of the movie is absolutely heartbreaking... watching these promising young children just accept their sad fate... all I feel is melancholy, and it only adds to the poignancy of this film.

Now I'll be thinking many sad thoughts at work...

Thanks to this movie, I am never going to volunteer to donate my DNA or eggs to anything, anyone, or any cause!

another mashup

Today Bunny and I brought in some baked yummies to celebrate a co-worker's birthday. I brought in my easy standby, chocolate chip cookies. But Bunny... that girl wowed us all with her red velvet cake pops!

red velvet cake covered in dark chocolate

So moist... nom!