Random Photo Entry 12: Summation of Current Affairs

One week from now, I will have done Marathon #5 and my last race before I bid farewell to the 19-24 age division. I'm excited to be doing another crazy feat in my relatively short life, but my legs/knees are not in the best shape right now. I'm sure it will be okay, but I can imagine that I won't be breaking any personal records. And I will probably be incapacitated from running for a while after the race. At least I've raised about $150, and that should keep me going if not by force.

I think I've gotten to a point (or maybe I was already there?) at which marathoning really isn't the cornerstone of my life as it may have been previously. I think I have given it a similar time commitment, but mentally, something(s?) has changed.

In other news, this weekend has been decently productive. I knocked off 1.5 of the 2 books I have set to read and submitted yet another dissertation proposal draft. My spring break is coming, so I hope I will not receive the draft back before the end of it so I can really enjoy my time away from academics! And when that draft comes back, I hope the changes will be scant this time around! Did I ever mention how unmotivated I am to be in the thick of this process? Agh!

Given that I don't know what else to say, here's a bunch of recent pictures that I've taken... note that this first one is not a picture. It's a music video of one of the songs from dance class. We primarily do salsa, but over time, we've gotten to learn some bachata and merenge as well. This song is our "bachata song," and I really like it a lot because it's super romantic and great to dance to.

Above: CPK's red velvet cake. I've written about this before, but I had it again so "The Ukrainian" could try it. We both agree that this is one of the better red velvet desserts out there!

Above: At some point, I had decided that I needed to see what my dancing looked like to a spectator. I've done this before to check out my starting technique in track and field, so this is one of the screenshots I pulled from that session. Totally embarrassing, I know. The sunglasses were to protect my identity, j/k!

Above: Speaking of embarrassing, I had mentioned that I went to see a show this past week, and here was some of the aftermath. I have to say... it was an excellent show! Those guys are so talented!

Above: This is the dinner I had before seeing the show. It was at Casita del Campo in Silver Lake, CA. What I loved most was that I just ordered this tostada salad with no other instructions, and it already came sans dairy. I lopped off the jalapeno and most of the guacamole, and deep inside, I found black beans and steamed veggies. Yay!

Above: On a random night, I also went to Swinger's. This is seriously one of my favorite diners, because it's near Hollywood and has lots of vegetarian and vegan options! I also like the atmosphere... not too pretentious but still weird enough to be "LA." This is vegan chilaquiles. Not what I expected, but yummy!

Above: These last two pictures were from Loving Hut (see here and here for my past references to this place). One is vegan fish tacos. They were fine, and so was that rice dish. However, they totally blew it. We ordered mocha vegan ice cream, and they gave it to another table and charged us for it. They apologized and asked us to remind them what flavor we wanted again, but they ended up just bringing us another bill without the ice cream on there. Ugh, the incompetence. It's not like the place was crowded at all! I am not sure if I want to go there again, though I need to consider the scarcity of vegan restaurants in my area.