Giant Race Expo

Posted by Lauren

On Sunday I’m running the Giant Race half marathon (last year was so fun!). With any race comes bib pick-up. Blah. Sometimes I enjoy expos and other times I find them bothersome and out of the way. Like today, for instance. I really needed to stay at work, finishing an installation of SAS – 11 billion bytes! However, I can’t make it to the expo Saturday… So I let the install do its thing and I’m crossing my fingers that I won’t have to start the 5-hour process all over again!

I rode my bike to Caltrain… Notice anything?

That’s right. I FINALLY got a rear rack + travel bag! I don’t have any more excuses to drive to work. Trust me, the sweaty back look (from wearing a heavy backpack) was not helping me make friends.

Umm… Before I get to the expo I just want to mention Wednesday’s date night in downtown Mountain View (prime view from the Caltrain station jogged my memory fyi)

So, we walked into Z Pizza with a $20 gift card. Lucky for us that we decided to use it that night, because they were going out of business that VERY night!! Talk about good timing! We split a large Californian salad and a small Tuscan pizza.

Although I’m not a frequent Z Pizza customer, I am sad to see the place go. Their specialty pizzas are always so good and they have GF options at no extra charge. Such a shame.

Despite the astronomical per ounce price, we went to the only self-serve froyo place on Castro – Yoogl.

Their stuff was decent, but I hope Yogurtland will take over the Z Pizza location! :) The name Yoogl is pretty perfect for Mountain View (aka Google City).

I forgot to blog Thursday night because I just HAD to watch the season finale of Bachelor Pad and build an intelligent cupcake data mart.

1. Shocked about what’s-his-face being a greedy turd and taking all the money!
2. Blakeley and the other what’s-his-name got engaged?!
3. Are Chris and Sarah a thing? I wanted them to win :(
4. Multigrain cheerios and pistachio Greek yogurt are excellent late-night fuel.

I’m using the personal edition of QlikView to build an associative pseudo-database for my cupcake recipes. The Martha book is full of scratchwork, notes and tips! Trying to go digital…. :)

Ok, now I’ll get to the Expo!

I got off the train and rode over to Pier 48. It was super close to the train station… Also, I have fond memories of Pier 48 from 2? 3? years of “Oktoberfest by the Bay”. Sigh.

There was ZERO line for the bib pick up and ZERO line for the bobbleheads!

Your eyes do not deceive you… That IS a Matt Cain (aka perfect game Cain) bobblehead decked out in athletic gear!

Actually, the whole warehouse was fairly empty! There was a DJ in the center of the room (nice!) and a bounce house “just for kids.” I wanted to try it out, but feared breaking my other wrist. No bueno.

The best part?

The Chobani Truck!

I requested to try the apple cinnamon flavor….

Oh my, oh my!! Fabulous. I just had to tell Nicole…

Haha, I love her response.

Happy Friday everyone! Enjoy your weekend!

-Lauren