Sweet home Chicago

Last weekend I made the trek home to the north suburbs of Chicago (Highland Park) to see my parents, show my girlfriend where I grew up, and catch a White Sox game.  Not having class on Thursday/Friday, I decided to jet out on Thursday morning to get some quality time with my parents before my girlfriend got in Friday evening.

Thursday and Friday were great, ran some errands with my mom and visited a few of my favorite lunch spots in my hometown.  Lindy flew in Friday night after she got off work, I picked her up at the airport and met my parents for dinner at a new restaurant that just opened in our town called Benjamins.  The food was fantastic, and the company even better.

Saturday was our touring day.  Lindy went with my mom to spinning class in the morning while I worked on a paper, and then when they got home I began to take her to all the sites of my childhood.  We went to my elementary school, middle school, the field I played baseball at growing up (Highwood field which has not changed a bit), the field I played both baseball and soccer at in high school (they've made some AWESOME improvements to Wolters field) to the high school, and then around downtown highland park including a nice trip to the lake (though the weather wasn't the most phenomenal).  We met my parents at Michaels Red Hots for lunch (kind of the go-to place in downtown HP) and then my mom wanted us to come into Goodies (the candy shop she works at) to say hi.

My sister at my bar mitzvah circa 1997

After that we went back to my house and looked at pictures.  We went through me and my siblings bar mitzvah albums (man my sister was a cute little kid), as well as some other pictures and then headed downtown for dinner.  We went to Joe's Stone Crab House and on the way down drove down Michigan Avenue so that Lindy could see the Magnificent Mile.

On Sunday we went to Walker Brothers Pancake House for breakfast for their famous baked apple pancake and then headed downtown to go to the White Sox game.  We took the scenic route downtown driving along the lake (first on Sheridan Drive and then on Lake Shore Drive) which afforded us not only a great view of Lake Michigan, but Lake Shore Drive's famous view of the Chicago skyline.

My dad had gotten us some phenomenal seats to the Sox game.  They were playing the Red Sox and the seats were so close you could actually reach out and touch the on deck batter (in fact, AJ Pierzynski, the White Sox catcher likes to mess with the fans by seeing if he can scare them taking his on-deck cuts suuuper close so that you think he's going to hit you).  The game was great, Gavin Floyd had his good stuff and pitched well and the White Sox cruised to a 4-1 win. 

Ragnar SoCal...203.5 Miles from LA to SD

So I've written previously describing the race I did last weekend.  It's called Ragnar, and it's a relay race where we ran from Los Angeles (Huntington Beach) to San Diego (Coronado Beach).  It was 203.5 miles and I ran it 4/20-4/21 with a few of my friends.  For five of us, this was our third Ragnar (having previously run Ragnar Las Vegas and Ragnar Florida Keys), for four others in our crew it was a first (good work, Albert, Ting, Katherine and Liz).  Others had done one previously. 

We flew in to LA on Thursday (race started Friday at 9:15 am) and went grocery shopping for all the provisions we'd need.  We were going to be running for the next 32 hours, so while we'd stop for meals, all our snacks, water, first aid supplies and run recovery concoctions would have to be with us in the vans.  We then drove out to Newport Beach where the race hotel was, and divvied up the provisions between the two vans on the two beds in the hotel room. 

The race began the following morning in Huntington Beach, CA.  Katherine (one of our van's newbies) was our first runner. 

 

While Katherine was running we gave her support (both moral and water).  We also decorated the van.  One of the cool things about Ragnar is you get to paint all over your vans.  On the right is me decorating the back of our van. 

Katherine rocked her first leg (5.1 miles) and then handed off to me (I also happened to be running 5.1 miles).  Though I was only running from 10-10:40 am (the day would subsequently get MUCH warmer - temps up to 98 degrees with a heat index near 115), running on the LA River (which for those of you who are unfamiliar with it, is not an actual river, but a concrete basin that water runs through) made it seem a lot warmer as the concrete basin just heated up the area tremendously.   

   Our van rocked through our initial runs despite the heat (and got to run by Angel Stadium which I thought was pretty cool), and some in the van decided to "shower" (by shower I mean use the very pleasantly smelling baby wipes that Katherine had brought to clean themselves up (as KDegs is doing in the picture). 

We arrived at the major interchange (where our van would pass the slap bracelet serving as a baton to van 2).  Kate (we had a lot of women who's names started with K on this trip) was waiting to take the hand off for her 8.8 mile trek in the deadly heat of the middle of the day  

 

After our van finished we went to the next major interchange (where after all the runners in van 2 had run, they'd be handing back off to our van).  Unfortunately, the heat kept rising and the route took van 2 further from the coast.  The insanely hot temperatures slowed them quite a bit and we were waiting for a while (so we had a picnic).

 

Albert easily got the best run of our van, getting to run along Lake Elsinore at sunset.  

 

While he was running the rest of us got to enjoy the pretty sunset...

 

and support him during his run.

 

Albert handed off to me and I ran my 9.3 mile leg (my longest, but in retrospect, also my easiest).  We ran through the night, handed off to the other van at around 2:30 am and drove to the next major interchange arriving around 3:30 to sleep before our third (and final) leg of the race.   The other van handed off to us around 6 am.  Katherine was again back in the first runner spot, so she was off and running on her last leg (5.5 miles).  She handed off to me and I was off on my last leg, a 7.3 mile trek.

 

 

What I hadn't appreciated (and what made this third and final leg so challenging) was that around mile 6 there was a MASSIVE hill that I'd be climbing.  Drained after having already run 20 miles, this hill was almost the end of me.  Going up, I felt like I was actually moving backwards, but I kept on moving putting one foot in front of the other.  The last half mile was down hill and I was hauling.  I wanted to give it every last ounce of strength I had left.

  

I handed off to Ting and collapsed in the van.  It was one of the most exhillerating feelings I've ever had.  We continued to run along the coastline outside of San Diego. Ting handed off to Kathleen (KDegs)...

who handed off to Albert and finally to Beth. 

Before handing off to the other van. We were done.  While we waited for the other van, we checked into our hotel, showered (real showers this time), and went out to brunch (which of course was accompanied by celebratory drinks), got some milkshakes, and took a well deserved nap. 

We met the other van at the finish line and ran across it as a team.  We'd made the 203.5 mile trek!!!

Grilling Season and Manly Brews Part II

Now that the calendar has turned to spring, it means that it's grilling season.  One of the joys of living in Philadelphia is the abundance of roof decks and patios.  My current apartment has a fantastic roof deck with an amazing view of the Philly skyline which makes for some relaxing sunsets up there. 

Last week I had a few friends over for a man night. We bought a bunch of steaks and craft brews from Sam Adams (not their normal seasonal or lagers, but their craft brews) to continue our brewery tour of the Northeast (in the fall we explored the manly brew series from Bar Harbor Brewery, hence the naming of the event).  We expanded from the four inaugural members last fall (Me, Adam, Dave, and Aaron) to add two more (Elliot and Phil).  We picked a perfect night for it, getting a balmy 85 degree evening, fired up the grill and began tasting some brews. 

Our steaks all turned out exceptionally well thanks to the grilling skills of Aaron.  He and Phil also made some delicious grilled mushrooms and onions as well as cooking some zucchini that Dave brought over.  We enjoyed seven different craft brews from Sam Adams, and had some excellent conversation.  

Apartment Hunting in Rittenhouse

So this past week I began the process of looking for a new apartment.  This will be the sixth apartment I've had since graduating college.  Basically, other than spending my second and third year of medical school in the same apartment, I haven't lived in the same place for more than 12 months since leaving for college in 2002.  Now, many of these moves have not been because I disliked the apartment I was living in (in fact, the only apartment I disliked was the one I lived in during my first year of medical school, and that had more to do with its location than the apartment itself).  Take my current situation, for example, I love my apartment, but my girlfriend and I decided to move in together, so we have to find a new place.

We're looking for either a June 15 or July 1 start date, which makes this a little bit early to start looking since most Philly apartments are on 60 day lease termination notifications, but it never hurts to get a feel for the market.  We've decided we want to stay in our current neighborhood (Rittenhouse Square/Fitler Square area), so that narrows things down.  We've discussed our priorities for our new place (I want an outdoor space like a deck or patio, and she wants a tub and washer dryer in unit.  We both would like a modern kitchen, especially a dishwasher.  If possible, I'd love a place with a fireplace, but that's negotiable).  We'd prefer to be in a brownstone or house not a large apartment complex

The Philly apartment market is an interesting thing, even within the same neighborhood, there is tremendous variation in the different apartments.  We're looking at two bedroom places, because last time when I was looking for my current place, some of the 2BR places I saw in my price range were actually more suited for couples looking to use the second "bedroom" as an office or nursery.  In many of these places the second bedroom was tiny, but the living space was great and the master bedrooms were great.  At the time, I was moving in with a roommate, so these types of places were less than ideal.  Now, they'd be perfect.  We'd like the extra space since we've both lived separately so have accumulated a lot of stuff, and figured that as we learned to live together, it wouldn't be a bad thing to have a little extra room so we aren't right on top of each other all the time.  A lot of these places are marketed as 2BR places, but in reality they're 1 BR places.  At the same time, there's also a ton of places that are legitimately 2BR places also in the same price range.  The Philly apartment market is much cheaper than New York, and even Boston and DC.  You also get a ton more for it.  My current place is a bi-level 2BR 2 full bathroom (with tub), we also have a private roof deck and a large kitchen in an awesome neighborhood. 

We've seen a few places so far, all have been nice (some too nice, in fact, putting them slightly out of our price range), and have a bunch more scheduled.  We've mostly been finding them on craigslist, but have also contacted a few realtors as well.  Hopefully we'll find a nice new place to call home.

A Fischer Family Passover

This past week/weekend my family came to town to celebrate Passover.  My mother came in last Tuesday to do most of the cooking in my kitchen and the rest of my family came in on Friday for the two Seders. 

After picking my mom up at the airport, we drove back to my apartment to take inventory of the kitchen (and for her to determine what we'd need to pick up the following morning at Wegmans).  After that, I had to head back to school for class, after which we, along with my girlfriend, finally made it to Amada.  The food was delicious. 

The next morning, my mother and I went to Wegmans to shop for the passover Seders.  She was incredibly impressed that we were actually able to get everything she needed to prepare for the Seders.  After getting back home and putting everything away, my mom began her epic three day quest to prepare the Seder.  That night we, along with two of my friends went to Zahav, an Israeli restaurant down in Old City, which is one of my favorite restaurants in the city.  We did their Tayim (their tasting menu), and everything was delicious.  On Thursday, I turned in my masters paper (wahoo!!) and we went to Zama for dinner.  It lived up to our billing as the best sushi restaurant in the city. 

On Friday my grandpa, dad and brother came in and we had our family Seder.  It was really great having everybody (minus my sister, who was missed) there.  My mom's food turned out great and we had a great time. 

Saturday morning my brother's girlfriend, Jamie arrived. The two of them, Lindy, me, my Dad and my grandpa and I went down to Independence Hall and walked around.  My grandpa is a big history buff and loved it 

We then got frozen yogurt at Sweet Endings and ate it in Rittenhouse Square since it was a beautiful spring day. 

The second Seder was just as good as the first (my mom made brisket, which is my favorite).  It was great getting to spend time with the family.  They all left today, but to paraphrase, next year in Philadelphia...