Irony
August 27, 2009
I spotted this car while driving yesterday and it pretty much blew my mind. And, being the faithful fail blog reader that I am, had to submit it. You can vote for it if you’re so inclined!
How can you put that on a BMW?! How?! And, to answer your question, no there was not some disgruntled ironic seventeen year old emo dude driving the car.
Norwegian Kringla
August 20, 2009
Perhaps it’s because I feel such tremendous change on the horizon (hello LSAT!) but recently I’ve had this heightened interest in getting in touch with my roots. And, since when I say “roots” I really only mean “eating lots of food from places I’m from” I’ve been hankering to do some Norwegian baking!
This sudden interest in my heritage has the added bonus of meaning I get to eat lots of things that don’t have calories… since I’m sure it goes without saying that when you eat for educational and cultural enrichment purposes there aren’t really any calories involved.
So in honor of this new interest I decided to throw a little potluck party last weekend (co-hosted by Chris, of course!) where everybody had to cook and bring a food from where they’re from!
I put the invitation I sent out to the above right. The text spacing looks weird because I had to take my address out for this (obviously!)
So for the event I decided to use one of my new Norwegian cooking books (thanks mom!) and make Norwegian Kringla. “What’s kringla” you ask? Well after extensive Internet research I’m confident saying it seems to mean a lot of different things! In my case it’s a sweeter bread with anise seeds in it shaped like figure 8s. So I could see it being served sort of like a dessert but it really isn’t sweet enough to be a dessert that would be very satisfying to me at least! However, it would be great with a very thin layer of frosting on top. Almost just a sweet glaze. The danger of course is over powering the delicate anise flavoring and generally airy bread feel its got going on.
Anyway! To the recipe! (From a book you really should get)
Ingredients:
2 packages of active dry yeast
1/2 cup warm water (between 105 and 115 F) [don’t get too hot or you’ll kill the yeast!]
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup melted butter [though next time I’ll try not melting it, since Chris is convinced it’s better not to]
1 cup light cream [I used half and half]
1 tablespoon anise seeds crushed [I mostly crushed them but it really doesn’t matter either way. Though the aromatics produced by crushing make it worth your time!]
2 eggs, room temperature
4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
melted butter to brush on top of finished (and delicious) kringla.
A few dashes of sugar to sprinkle on top of finished (and delicious) butter-glazed kringla
Official Directions:
In large mixing bowl, dissolve yeast in the warm water. Add 1 Tablespoon of the sugar and let stand until yeast foams, about 5 minutes. Add the remaining sugar, butter, cream, anise seed, and eggs. Beat well. Stir in the flour, 1 cup at a time, beating well to keep mixture smooth and satiny. All of the flour should be moistened. Cover and refrigerate for 2 to 24 hours. Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper or grease lightly. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured work surface. Cut it into pieces the size of large walnut. Roll out to strands about 8 inches long. Twist into figure-8s. Place on baking sheets. Let rise 1 hour until puffy. Preheat oven to 400 F. Bake for 15 minutes until golden. Brush baked kringla with melted butter. These are best served just out of the oven.
My slight changes to said directions/ suggestions for improvements:
- You must must must check on the kringla in the oven. In my case they only needed to be baked for 8 minutes. Any more and they most certainly would have burnt. Also, I personally think they’re more delicious if you make them a little bigger than the recipe suggests. Probably more delicious because you get more per serving!
- I’d really recommend (like I mentioned) whipping up a perhaps powdered sugar based glaze and trying it on top of a few. I think it’s really hit the spot!
- Next time I might add just a dash of vanilla and cardamom.
- Next time I’ll definitely make more. The minute I put them out on the table they were snached up! Some people didn’t even get one!
The party was a success (I’d say a party lasting from 6PM till about 1:30AM classifies as a success!) and I had a great opportunity to test out my hand at baking. Some of the highlights from the party include: Chris’ ceviche (with authentic Peruvian flavors thanks to our close proximity to the Mission), Eric’s "bangers and mash” (look, I didn’t name it!), and Esther’s fried rice (god I love fried rice with all the little goodies in it!) Oh! And Chris’ friends Casey and Jake brought some really yummy noodle dish that tasted more like apple pie.
Expect more cooking-apades in the future!
Half Dome Glory!
October 8, 2008
During the weekend of September 27th, a brave and fearless group did the unthinkable! the unimaginable! They hiked Half Dome!!
“Wait…this happened during the weekend of the 27th? It’s friggin October 8th, Heather. Why have you become such a lame and late blogger?”
Alright. I accept the criticism. But at least let me attempt to mount a defense.
First, I moved. Finally! No more creepy-land for me! So I got back from Half Dome glory Sunday night and spent Monday packing (because of course I had packed exactly nada before leaving… Naturally) and on Tuesday the movers came! And then, as if that weren’t enough, on Wednesday I had to go to an ethics and compliance conference all day. See? So busy!
So I thought I’d write this over the weekend but, alas, every time I open my blogging program on my personal computer it freezes. I tried deleting it and re-installing but to no avail. And then to make matters worse, my camera got stolen!! At, ironically enough, Lovefest! So all my Half Dome glory pictures were lost! So I’m writing today because I’ve finally come to the conclusion that no, someone is not going to respond to my craigslist lost and found post. My baby camera is gone. And I just bought that thing in June!!!
The good news is my trusty fellow adventurers took plenty of pictures. And, of course, my trusty flip is still with me.
So now on to the story…
The players. First, let’s introduce them via video (because video makes everything more interesting):
So in words you’ve got:
Eric (who you’ve met before)
Sarah (a friend of mine from way back in the day. [“the day” being junior high])
Sam (Eric’s friend. They met while backpacking in Alaska together with NOLS)
Sean (A fellow Googler who I met for the first time while getting in his car to drive up to Yosemite. Basically I sent an email out to the SF2G list saying that our campsite could hold two more and, if anyone wanted to come along for guts and glory, they were more than welcome. Sean was game and so was…)
Jacob (the second Googler to respond. I met him for the first time the day before we left while biking to work)
Me (but of course)
So how’d it go?
Well first off, it took us about forever to get there. Why? Because we got lost, oh, conservatively, about a zillion times. Jacob is a software engineer. Doesn’t that mean he should be good at directions?! Well we found out that’s just not true. Well it’s not true that he’s no good at navigating… I still contend that as a software engineer he should be. 
It’s entirely possible we drove at least 50 completely unnecessary miles. Now I didn’t really care but we all learned that Sarah gets pretty car sick pretty easily. And the idea of her puking all over Sean’s lovely car was sort of a figure-out-how-to-get-there-quickly motivating factor.
But I’m happy to report no throwing up occurred.
So after getting lost, listening to the presidential debate while eating dinner while driving, and lots of over-shares, we made our way to Tuolumne meadows. Eric and Sam, who drove up from LA (and were expecting us to arrive before them by a few hours), were already there.
At that point we went straight to bed (I think it was already passed 11pm…and the idea is to start Half Dome ridiculously early).
Well here’s some advice for future badass hikers. Tuolumne meadows is really not a good choice for campsite location. I didn’t really understand this ahead of time and couldn’t have prevented our going there anyway because:
1. I’ve only been to Yosemite twice and neither time did I actually camp there – so I don’t have a mental map of where everything is.
2. I’m told that Tuolumne was the last open camp area by the time we made reservations.
But anyway, the point is this: Tuolumne is about an hour drive away from “the valley” – which is where you start the half dome hike. So if you want to, say, start the hike at 6, you’ve got to leave the campsite a little before 5 – which means you’re eating nasty oatmeal at like 4:30.
And that’s going to be a big “no”
So instead we opted for the late start variety. And by that I mean we probably started hiking about 9:30.
Pretty much right away we knew we were going to have a problem. Sarah’s backpack weighed a significant portion of her total bodyweight and about five minutes in she said something like “Whoa. This backpack is killing me!!”
At that point I looked at Eric and gave him the “this means problems” look.
But no matter, we forged on.
Basically there were a LOT of stairs, a LOT of dirt particles in my face, a LOT of sour gummy octopi (my hiking snack of choice), and a LOT of me wanting to steal everyone else’s water.
Which brings me to another point. I, when hiking, prefer to drink an insane amount of water. I brought two bottles, each about 32 oz (so that’s 8 8oz glasses for those of you keeping track) and I could have easily finished them off by lunch (which was at about 11:45). Instead, I finished them near the top and decided to take water from dear old Eric. He of course is used to this. When we bike together I’m fairly confident he brings that second bottle specifically because he wants to make sure he gets at least one bottle for himself.
[*side story* When I was young I was, let’s just say, quite plump. When I’d say something to my mom about this her response was always, “Oh, Heather. If there were a nuclear explosion and we were in some sort of food-barren post-apocalyptic setting, you’d outlive everyone! You’re just built hearty because you’re built to last!”
Beyond thinking this didn’t really make me feel any better, mainly because I couldn’t convince myself that the chances of that happening were high enough to make my then-current suffering worth it, I now know that in reality she was wrong! Even if I could live on very little food for a long period of time, I sure as hell would die of dehydration long before everyone else! So I totally lose!]
So back to half dome… the hiking continued. And then continued some more. Oh and then some more after that.
So that was exciting (in a masochistic way) – plus I really enjoyed seeing the happy proud squirrels running around.
The bad news was that we were hearing the line to go up the cables was two hours!! And, considering we started really late, that would mean not getting back until well after sunset. This concerned me because doing the Vernal fall stairs in the dark (not everyone had lights with them) is just plain dangerous.
So we had a solution. We decided to create a new top of half dome and claim our victory there. See our explanation…
So after that we hauled it down to the valley, barely breaking at all.
One thing I distinctly remember was fantasying about the water fountain at the base of Vernal Falls. We were out of water early on the descent and all I could think about was how much water I was going to drink. Like frakin gallons of water. I wanted to swim in a sea of drinking fountain water, sprout gills, and just gulp and whatever-gills-do-to-water all the water in existence.
And upon arrival at said water fountain I pretty much did exactly that. I think I drank somewhere along the lines of eight to ten glasses of water in about two minutes. Felt a bit sick afterwards, but oh it was worth it.
At the end we ended up eating at the buffet in Curry Village because the pizza line was out of control. No matter – it was delicious.
After that we got s’more stuff (I made s’more eating a requirement), drank a lot of alcohol, and had fun hanging out around the campfire.
The next day we got up, got some food (sadly by the time we got there breakfast was over!), and made the long and significantly less chit-chatty drive back.
So overall it was an intense and awesome experience. It was great to meet some fellow Googlers and it was great to finally get out for some outdoorsy goodness.
I can’t wait for our next trip!
…though I am more than willing to wait for the next I-can’t-properly-bend-my-legs-for-four-days experience.
Oh and thanks to Sean and Sarah for their photos!
I’m Alive!
September 18, 2008
I have, for the past month or so, utterly failed as a blogger. So much has happened and I’ve been so busy that I totally neglected to keep the blog updated with all of my adventures (and, as will be explained shortly, misadventures).
Well I’m ending this egregious lapse in good judgment here and now!
So what’s happened…
First and foremost, I stopped my once-a-week blogging routine because I endured a nasty bike crash on August 29th (so a week after my previous post). The short story: drafting is a lot more risky than I previously thought (the caveat being I didn’t think it dangerous at all before the crash! But at least now my fears and concerns are now more closely aligned with reality!) For the long version you can read my accident report on the SF2G blog. As you’ll notice, there was a lot of crying, a lot of pain, and a lot of bad fashion decisions. And, for the visually inclined, the picture to the right gives you an idea of what one of my cuts looked like 24 hours after the moment of badness, darkness, and evil. When I took the bandages off this sucker I literally started the blackout process. I looked down, saw how gross it was (and felt how painful it was), and my vision tunneled and my hearing warped. I then proceeded to say over and over “I’m gonna pass out…uuhhhh…I’m gonna throw up….uhh… pass out…throw up” It was no good. The accident was also bad from a cost perspective. I still haven’t gotten the ambulance bill (gods help me) but somehow my beautiful SIDI bike shoes were somehow lost!! I remember the nurse taking them off in the ER and that was the last time I saw them. My babies!! So I had to go buy new ones and it sucked on two counts: 1) That was $220 I would have rather NOT spent, and 2) the color scheme of my old ones isn’t produced anymore!! So I had to get them in red! But I’m not red! I’m blue! Bikers are either red or blue! You can’t be both!! …so I’m figuring out what to do about that. Oh… and my handlebars are permanently bent. 
Now on to better news… I just got back a few days ago from my first business trip to Europe! I visited the Paris, London, and Dublin offices – all in one crazy hectic week. I was responsible for managing the entire trip for my team – from initial conception all the way through. And so, you can imagine, leading up to the trip I was ridiculously busy. Crap, during the trip I was probably only getting three hours of sleep a night since there was so much to do. I’ll explain more about the trip in a separate post, but for now I’ll say it was probably the single most valuable work-learning experience I’ve ever had. The way I saw the company and my team’s role before the trip is very very different from the way I see those things now. Not only that, but I better appreciate the challenges a truly global team and company faces. That, and now I see how, really, it’s not all like Mountain View. - I started an internal (internal to Google) blog for my team! So now Googlers can keep better up to date with the happenings of their global ethics and compliance team! Yay! An excuse to do my favorite things more (write, take pictures and video, and draw crazy paint pictures!)
- I started taking an online course through Harvard’s extension program. The class is called: Life, Liberty, and Happiness after the Digital Explosion. Take a look at the syllabus and reading list – it’s going to be extremely illuminating and absolutely instrumental to my figuring-out-my-thoughts-on-web 2.0-issues mission. I’m particularly interested in privacy, censorship, and data security – from cultural, legal, and ethical angles – so I think this class will help create a foundation for thinking more clearly about those topics.
I’m still, slowly but surely, chipping away at my larger year-long project with Sally Gibbons from the UCLA Center for Society and Genetics. I’m not sure if I’ve talked about it in any depth before but, on a high level, it’s a paper on creating a new ethical framework from which we can evaluate the value of human enhancement technologies. I presented on it at an undergraduate research conference in Spring (and even got first place for it!) but there’s just an incredible amount of work that still needs to be done on it. But, when I have something that even remotely looks like a draft, you’ll know where you’ll be able to find it - And finally, though this will sound a bit cryptic to most, I’m feeling a lot better. And, for the first time in quite a long time, I’m starting to feel like I’m getting back to my old self again. (Oh what would Carl Elliott have to say about that statement!) …but really, I think it’s travel. It makes you sit back and reevaluate… and then realize that your resources are limited and there are better and worse things you can use them up on. So go me!
I’ll write again soon!
7000 feet of quad and booty burning glory
August 2, 2008
On Saturday the cycling sirens sang yet again. And this time the call had a “climb epic heights” ring to it. And, since we all know how siren calls go, I had to oblige.
The ride was a from-somewhere-between-Burlingame and Woodside, up Old La Honda, through Pescadero, out to Half Moon Bay, and up and over back down to Canada road-loop. For written directions of what we did go here. And, if you’re more visually oriented, you can see a very rough gmap of it here instead. Suffice to say, the ride was truly one of great glory. Having never climbed anything like that before, I was super proud of myself. Looking back and seeing countless hills in the far distance, and then knowing that you’ve climbed them, makes for a pretty awesome moment. Plus, it’s just such a gorgeous ride. Zillions of redwood trees, isolated little towns, wildflowers, the ocean — it’s just fantastic.
So here’s the beginning…
Step one: find purportedly delicious coffee place (Philz - in the Mission)
Step two: buy and taste test said purported deliciousness
(note to other caffeine/coffee junkies: ’tis quite delicious. They add their sugar and homemade cream for you…and it’s heavenly. And, since it’s not like you added the sugar and cream yourself, it totally doesn’t count as bad for you!)
Step Three: Stock up on emergency fuel (this ride I went with the jelly beans… errr… I mean extreme sports beans!)
Step Four: Size up the competition. I’m obviously victorious on three counts: shoe style, sock choice, and for actually having a tan… at all
Step Five: Ride!
Step Six: Climb epic hills
Step Seven: Relish in hill-climbing glory (perhaps prematurely, but go on! relish!)
(that’s my friend, Eric — he rides for UCLA Triathlon)
Step Eight: Whenever possible, fulfill and/or rekindle childhood memories and fantasies
(check out the video below to understand why this is so awesome!)
Step Nine: Climb (and descend!!oh yes descend!!) about a frak-load more
Step Ten: Find deliciousness and never ever let go of it
Step Eleven: Get slackers up
Step Twelve: Appreciate nature (and by “appreciate” I mean kiss)
Step Thirteen: Bike a LOT more… over a LOT more hills. And then, enjoy the view
Step Fourteen: Take more pictures with childhood landmarks. This will help you show off to friends and relatives later on.
Step Fifteen: Finish!! And, though not recommended, optionally: try and look like a badass while dripping in sweat and clothed in bright spandex.
Step Sixteen: Get together with great homies and eat lots and lots of hamachi sashimi!
The end! But for all the photos, go here