Better Off Ted — cancelled after two seasons, it’s a show about a soulless company, a few nerds, an enjoyable boss, Lindsay from Arrested Development, and a good amount of ST. Episode 0104, Racial Sensitivity, can’t be missed, it’s one of the funniest episodes of of anything ever.

Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret — with G.O.B. and Tobias from Arrested Development, the show follows a hopeless Portlandian as he tries to sell Londoners a toxic-ish energy drink. I can describe the show in these words: painfully funny, with lots of peeing (on the show).

As preparation for the Drumstick Dash 10k (which I haven’t registered for yet, and registration is closed, hmm) in Minneapolis, I ran a new personal record for distance tonight, 6.01 miles, but an anti-record for speed (7.x mph). Where a fortnight (yes, I love that term) ago I was freaking out about running anything more than 3.1 miles, I now feel pretty good about my chances (read: of finishing, not of coming in the top-90%, heh). So all that’s left is convincing the race organizers to let me register late as the token Californian. To my favorite email client!

GPS track for tonight’s run

In addition to the running, the day was a lot of fun: The race announcer was pretty funny (sometimes/always unintentionally), the post-race food very good (my first peanut butter in like 4 months), the day almost perfect (they had forecast rain, which didn’t happen at all), and a bunch of us getting hot dogs and beer after the race.

All thanks to BigDaveWave and the great race/experience today, I’ve already signed up for a 5k on the 15th, and might consider doing a 10K (Drumstick Dash?) once I’m back in the Twin Cities for Thanksgiving. Yay running!

Overall results: http://www.svetiming.com/BigWaveDave/events/2011/Run-with-the-Jets-Bay-Area-Half-Marathon-10k5k/results
GPS Track: http://www.worksmartlabs.com/cardiotrainer/tracks.php?trackId=695976022&sig=ad48215cc610513859e46f657286bbbea2abb77b

Previous results:
20:44 White Bear Winter Frolic 5K (2005)
21:53 Winter Waddle (2004)

Step 1: Get MyTracks from Android Market (Step 0: purchase Android phone if you don’t already have one).
Step 2: From MyTracks, ‘Record track.’ This does the actual GPS logging for you, and embeds stats (e.g. max speed, elevation gain, etc) into the track.
Step 3: Do something fun, outside. Make sure to take lots of (geo-tagged) photos/videos (your Android telephone can do this for you).
Step 4: When done with step 3, stop recording track from inside MyTracks. When this is done, long press on newly-created track, select ‘Send to Google’ and choose Maps as the home for your track data. Be sure to choose an easy-to-remember name name for this new map (mine: ‘Kayaking the Otter Tail River’).
Step 5: Upload media from step 3 to Picasa (or if you have G+ mobile, instant upload should already have done this for you).
Step 6: From step 5, create a Picasa album for your trip and populate with the media capturing during your trek. Once done, right click and copy url from ‘View in Google Earth’ link. This is a kml file which makes it easy to view your photos in a geo browser (e.g. Google Maps, Google Earth).
Step 7: Navigate to Google Maps, select ‘My Places’ and choose edit on the named map from step 4 (trust me, it should be there). Click import and paste the url of the Picasa album kml from step 6.
Step 8: Click save and done on the map, click on the link icon on the top right of the map to get url for sharing. Viola! 10 minutes!

View Kayaking the Otter Tail River in a larger map

Download KML

Wow.

Sunday, I got to attend the USS San Francisco memorial service, which honored the men serving aboard the USS San Francisco, a heavy cruiser which served throughout WWII. After the event, I got a chance to meet Pearl Harbor survivor Joe Whitt, who graciously spent a few minutes with me talking about his experiences. With less than 7,500 Pearl Harbor survivors left, talking to Joe really was a treat.

Preceding the memorial service, I went for a little hike along the Land’s End trail, which follows San Francisco’s rocky Northwestern Shore. Sunday was a great day to be outside, and I got some great shots of the Golden Gate bridge along the way. After the service, I was craving a burrito and found a good one at Chino’s Taqueria in the Richmond (sidenote: I l-o-v-e San Francisco, if for nothing else you can find a great, great burrito in any neighborhood, at any time).

On Memorial Day itself, I went to the services at Golden Gate National Cemetery, where vets and distinguished guests (even a former presidential candidate) spoke on the value of honoring our veterans. Following the service, I walked around the cemetery, there were flags on all 100,000+ graves, and many had flowers too. Walking among the myriad tombstones of men who died way, way too young really brings home the sacrifice our veterans made for this country. Along my walk, I did find Chester Nimitz‘s grave (and those of his staff, (e.g. Spruance) which they all agreed to while living, cool) among other notables (and selected randoms, whom I tried to learn more about when I got home).

In all, a really great weekend. I do kick myself for having not had a chance to talk to more vets (esp. WWII) over the years, their bunch is really fading away quickly, and the stories they tell are all so extraordinary (along those same lines, I recently started reading The Good War — An Oral History of WWII, which I highly, highly, highly recommend for anyone wanting to hear their stories).

View Memorial Day Weekend 2011 in a larger map
Download KML

In my attempts to make the perfect smoothie, I’ve found a recipe that I can confidentially share with any noogler. I call it The Dancing Strawberry:

1 bunch fresh spinach (organic)
1 pint strawberries (organic)
3 peaches (organic)
2 cups ice cold water
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Enjoy with the aforementioned frosty glass and a granola bar (or if you prefer, Bavarian creme donut). You can put any excess smoothie (I usually have just a glass) in a mason jar, where it’ll store for a day or two in the fridge.

EDIT: Gah, blurry photos, apologies.