Cooking: Cucumber Feta Rolls

Bite-sized pieces of rolled deliciousness.

So, tomorrow is CENTURY 21 Award's Escondido office client appreciation night and LiveWell San Diego will be there providing free chair massages. Each vendor is responsible for bringing an appetizer, and which means that I'll be making something for Taylor to share :)

Thanks to Pinterest, my new favorite evening tradition, I've come across multiple baked and cooked goodies that I'm itching to try... these were first on that list.

Triple Crown 2012: Carlsbad Half

Part one of the 2012 Triple Crown is officially demolished!

And what a good freaking feeling it is :) Official time came in at a steady 2:40:14... which is 10 minutes slower than my PR but a whole 5 minutes faster than Silver Strand. I'll take it!

On the whole, this race felt much better than SS. The energy was up, the expo was FANTASTIC (free eyebrow waxes anyone?) and it was a perfect overcast day. As usual, I overheated with a long sleeve shirt on and quickly tied it around my waist, and somehow STILL ended up with tan lines, but I couldn't have asked for better running conditions.

Unfortunately, I did sustain an injury. I think it might have something to do with being on my feet all day in heels for the 2-3 days leading up to the race but can't be sure. It started in both my Achilles within the first mile and slowly, painfully crawled up my left calf and into the right of my knee cap. It was a case of mind over matter up until about mile 10, at which point I was almost in tears with every other step. The worst part: the pain intensified on the downhills, so no making up time there :(

This was by far the most supportive race I've participated in, from the volunteers to the spectators. Not only was the whole experience smooth, but volunteers were happy to refill my water bottle in addition to hand out cups, kept the course immaculate around the hydration stations, and offered plenty of you're almost there!'s. And the spectators... high fives, pom poms, fantastic encouragement signs (see after the jump)... I've never felt so cheered on.

I'm expecting a 1.5-2 week recovery period, and hopefully by that time it will start staying lighter a bit longer. My biggest cripple is the inability to run safely (alone) after dark. That being said, between the Triple Crown being in full swing and my brother's upcoming summer wedding, running has inched a bit higher on my priority list.

A whole lot more pics and my splits after the jump :)

The Day the Internet Went Black...ish...

This gif lovingly borrowed from The Oatmeal.
Please don't sue me.

So today the internet went black...ish. Some sites went down completely, others went down on first glance but provided workarounds to access content, and some slapped black bars on their logo but still worked perfectly.

It's all a response to SOPA/PIPA. I am in no way qualified to explain this, so I'll let Google do the talking:

1. SOPA and PIPA would censor the Web
2. SOPA and PIPA would be job-killers because they would create a new era of uncertainty for American business
3. SOPA and PIPA wouldn’t stop piracy

Obviously, there's a lot more than these three points, but in the interest of space (and assuming that you already read the diatribe) I'll keep it short. If your head was under a rock today, here's the full article.

Unfortunately, the internet was still in enough working order that (minus a few out-of-habit visits to Wikipedia followed by an immediate "Oh, SNAP!") I still had to work, so I did miss a few of the protest sites, namely Reddit. That aside, please enjoy this gallery of internet history.

Also, in a weird Catch-22 type way, should SOPA/PIPA pass in some form, this website is subject to immediate takedown due to a ton of copyright infringement in this post alone. Crap.

If you weren't one of the 4.5 million people to sign the petition today, you can make it happen with the banner below.

UPDATED: 2012 Bucket List

Things I'd like to see happen in 2012 (to be updated/appended/added on to as the year goes on)

• See my "five" in person
• Alysse Aviles
• Hunt Beaty - Accomplished 1/7-1/15/12
• Elizabeth Noto - Accomplished 1/10/12, but no photo evidence b/c Liz is a goober.
• Ben Saltzman
• Leah Yamshon
• Complete the Triple Crown Series
• Carlsbad Half Marathon - Accomplished 1/22/12
• La Jolla Half Marathon
• America's Finest City Half Marathon
• Complete the NYC Marathon *assuming I get picked in the lottery
• Survive the "Apocalypse"

With Hunt in BK