More Fun and Eats in Dallas

In addition to attending the State Fair of Texas and running the Carson's Crusaders 5K, my weekend in Dallas was filled with more eats, activity and hanging out with a special pup named Waffles.

After the State Fair, we headed by lightrail to the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza. The museum is located on the sixth floor of the former Texas School Book Depository (now the Dallas County Administration Building) and details the life and death of John F. Kennedy. It is from this location on the sixth floor that Lee Harvey Oswald fired the shots that would kill JFK.

The exhibition was sobering and intriguing because it seems after all of these years, questions still exist as to what really happened that day.

Outside on Dealey Plaza, white X's mark the spots where JFK was hit. 

Also nearby is the John F. Kennedy Memorial.

For dinner, we headed to Plano's Tasty Tails for two pounds of cajun-spiced snow crab legs, one pound of shrimp and corn and potatoes. Tasty Tails is located in an Asian food court with so many noms that I wanted to eat everything. Alas, I only had room for Tasty Tails. We took it back to the sister's place to enjoy. It was so spicy and delicious. It hurts so good!

After we completed the 5K Saturday morning, the remainder of the weekend was pretty relaxed. We had lunch at a Chinese restaurant called Potstickers and Boba Tea located in Frisco. I must admit that I am quite jealous of the availability of good, cheap, authentic Asian cuisine in the Dallas area. I was very spoiled living in Los Angeles for so long. After living in the Mid-Atlantic and now Albuquerque, I understand what it is like to lack easy access to many of my favorite foods.

As the name suggest, Potstickers and Boba Tea serves potstickers and boba. I ordered an almond milk tea and the sister and brother-in-law shared a "Texas-size" green tea.

We also shared an order of pork potstickers. They were mouth-searingly hot and so tasty! We each also ordered bowls of beef noodle soup (one of my favorite Chinese dishes, which I sadly eat for too infrequently), but I forgot to snap photos of them.

For dinner, we headed to North Dallas's Sushi Robata. I have been craving good, authentic Japanese food. The Japanese restaurants in Albuquerque are, by and large, extremely mediocre and not authentic.

We started off with a parade of small plates: takoyaki (octopus balls), potato salad and I had a tarako onigiri (fish roe rice ball).

Following our appetizers, we had our sushi and sashimi course, which included yellowtail jalapeno, oshinko maki (pickled radish roll), and an assortment of nigiri.

As you can see, the menu at Robata is varied, but they seem to do everything we tried really, really well. To round out our meal, we ordered some fried dishes: chicken and squid legs.

For our last course, we shared the fried bananas and mochi. I think we may have gone a little overboard but it was so much good food! 

We also spent a good amount of time relaxing at home. My sister is a collector of many different things, especially Disney. A few of her collections include The Little Mermaid and Sailor Moon merchandise, plus this collection of Chip N Dale pins. 

Another special part of my visit was meeting their 2 year old Welsh Pembroke Corgi for the first time. Waffles is a cutie!

My final meal of this trip was at Mash'd in Frisco. They are known for their moonshine cocktails, but I decided not to have one for lunch. Instead, I had a delicious fried chicken burger with slaw, pickles and lemon aioli. The fries were disappointing though. They were way too seasoned. 

I am so glad I got to visit Dallas for the weekend. It was great seeing my family members, and I love Waffles! Hopefully, he and Gus will get to meet some day. 

Have a safe and fun Halloween!

Fun at the State Fair of Texas

While I was visiting my sister, I got to attend the State Fair of Texas (aka Fried Everything Under the Sun Festival). The state fair has been going on since 1886 and is held at Fair Park in Dallas.

Big Tex is the symbol of the State Fair. Unfortunately, he burned down in 2012, so this was my first time seeing the new Big Tex. He sure looks spiffy!

Now, this was not my first time to this rodeo. I have attended the State Fair several times before: during my childhood when I lived in Fort Worth and after my sister moved back to Texas, so I know the main attraction for me is sampling some of the glorious fair foods on offer. 

First up is the must-eat: Fletcher's corny dog. 

We usually share the items we sample during the fair, but we each had to have our own corny dog or else it just wouldn't feel right. All of the other items consumed over the course of the day were shared between the three of us.

In my bid to eat something non-fried, I got a Mexican-style corn on the cob. Silly me. 

This was followed by some fried s'mores.

We took a break from eating to visit some of the pavilions. Yes, there are other goings on at the fair besides getting your arteries clogged. There is shopping.

You can check out the submissions to the Creative Arts Competitions. The variety of categories is astounding. They run from pickling to needlework to photography.

Don't forget to check out the Butter Sculpture. What is a butter sculpture you ask? Well, it is simply a sculpture carved out of butter. Every year the theme changes. This year's was wild mustangs. Impressive, no?

There is also a huge Auto Show that occupies two entire buildings. This little Fiat was being hand-painted for charity while we were there. So amazing.



There are also livestock viewings, dog shows and pig races. We checked out the bunny competition. Many of them were giving us looks of disapproval.

Bunnies gave looks of disapproval, were ready for take-off, or hid in hay

Besides that, there is also live music, a midway with games and rides and much more. We went back to our original mission and that was to eat. One of the last things we had that day was chicken fried bacon. I had this the last time I visited the fair, which was also the first year this item was introduced, and I remember it being much better last time. 

Fried Sriracha Balls was one of the new items for this year. Each year the new offerings sound stranger and stranger. By the way, we did not sample the Sriracha Balls.

We made it to the late afternoon and were appropriately stuffed to the gills. Now, I plan to avoid fried things for the next six months!

Carson's Crusaders Foundation Trek or Treat 5K 2014 - Race Recap

I have now officially run in seven states! Last week, I was in DC for work for a couple of days and then visited my sister in Dallas for the weekend (more on that later).

My sister, brother-in-law and I are all in the midst of Wine & Dine training, so we decided at the last minute to do a run together while I was I town. We chose the Carson's Crusaders Foundation Trek or Treat 5K, which was held at Watters Creek at Montgomery Farm in Allen, Texas. Despite what its name might suggest, Watters Creek is actually an outdoor shopping mall. That's one setting I have definitely not run in before!

As races go, this one had a fairly late start time at 8:30 am, which meant the sun was up. 

Obligatory pre-race photo

The start and finish lines were both in the middle of the shopping mall. Too bad none of the shops were open yet though! The race started right on time and we were off.

The first part of the race made a loop around the shopping mall. 

I was surprised that behind the mall were beautiful tree lined paths. Most of the distance wound up being in this setting. The course was pretty much an out and back which meant we had to share the paths with runners coming back in the other direction. At times, this made the course very narrow and confusing.

The trail led to a gorgeous lake that we did a loop around. As you can see, the weather was just perfect for a 5K. It was sunny, slight breeze and no humidity. 

I have not run a timed 5K in quite some time, so before I knew it, I had reached the finish line! 

I grabbed a banana and some water and joined up with my brother-in-law who was right behind me. I rarely, if ever, drink milk, but there is just something about chocolate milk after a race that I love! Sister came through a short time later. 

Besides wanting to run with my sissy, I also really wanted to find out if I have really become super slow or if it is the altitude in Albuquerque that is doing me in. 

Turns out, I was able to PR in this race, so it is not me. Hooray! What a difference 5,000 feet makes!

I have been running about 12-13 minute miles in New Mexico, but check out my split times on this day:

Mile 1: 10:03

Mile 2: 10:45

Mile 3: 10:16

Official finish time: 32:19

I also placed 99th overall. Not a great feat but I love the number. It was a fun race and I am happy that I not only get to cross another state off the list but that I PR-ed! Thank you, Texas!

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Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta 2014

Our first Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta has come and gone, and it was a bit of a disappointment for us.

If you are not familiar with the Balloon Fiesta, it is an annual hot air balloon event that takes place in Albuquerque. The Balloon Fiesta first took place in 1972 and is now the largest hot air balloon event in the world. It also has the distinction of being the most photographed event in the world and is one of the major tourist attractions for the city of Albuquerque.

We decided to go to the morning session on the second day of the festival, which was Sunday, October 5, 2014.

We left for the Park N Ride lot at around 4:45 am and arrived at Balloon Fiesta Park around 5:30 am. After arriving, we walked around the vendor area for quite a while, waiting for the action to start. Since it was so early and cold, we grabbed some hot beverages and purchased breakfast burritos to fill our bellies.

The time set for Dawn Patrol was 5:45 am. This time came and went with nothing happening. We headed down to the field at around 6:30 am, the time for Morning Glow. This time came and went. Still nothing. 

At this point, we saw a few balloon pilots inflate a few regular balloons and let them go into the air. It was obvious that it was far too windy for them to fly. The official festival flag was also yellow and flapping like crazy in the wind.

Balloon Basket Sitting on the Field

The sun finally started coming up and there still was nothing happening. By the time 7 am, the scheduled time for Mass Ascension, rolled around and there still wasn't anything going on, I was ready to throw in the towel. We overheard one of the "zebras," Balloon Fiesta launch directors, say that they would decide by 10 am whether to cancel or not. 10 am! We were in for a long day.

Balloon Fiesta Zebra

Finally at 8 am, after two and a half hours of standing in the cold, the Mass Ascension was cancelled and instead, many of the balloon pilots inflated their balloons for a ground display.

Balloons are finally going up!

This did not last long though, because the winds started to pick up again and the balloons quickly went down at around 8:30 am.

Sleeping Cow

Strong winds, they are. 

Although this is not what we were expecting to see that morning, I am glad we stuck it out until 8 am. Otherwise, it would have been an entirely wasted morning.

We planned on going to the Night Glow on Friday, October 10th, but this was also cancelled due to rain.

Since we both have to work and we had a lot to do during the weekends with our house, we couldn't schedule another good day to visit the Balloon Fiesta. While the days we were able to go to the festival were bad days weather-wise, many of the other days went off without a hitch!

Hopefully, we have better luck next time because I am still waiting to see the amazing sight of hundreds of balloons launching at the same time!