I have done, and failed to blog about, a number of things lately.

Thing 1:  Fondue at Kashkaval.  After my excursion to Artisanal, fondue was clearly the thing to do.  Instead of going back to Artisanal (huge, high-ceilinged, thoroughly French, midtown-Easty), I went to Kashkaval, which is basically the opposite - cramped, even by NYC standards, with a much younger crowd and serving Middle Eastern tapas (which I didn't try) in addition to the fondue, and also housing a cheese-and-fancy-foods shop (which I didn't look closely at, being spoiled by the many cheese shops in my neighborhood).  The meal consisted primarily of melted cheese with dessert starring melted chocolate, so of course it was awesome.  Also interesting, because I had never had anything with cheese fondue besides bread, and on this occasion tried both vegetables (ranging from the good - mushrooms, broccoli - to the weird - peppers, which are not weird themselves but don't really go with cheese, insofar as anything can not go with cheese) and meats (the meats were very good; dipping them in cheese did not particularly improve them).

Thing 2: Excursion to DC.  The purpose of this trip was to organize and pack up my remaining possessions at my parents' house, although it felt kind of like the purpose was to spend ten hours on a bus over the course of two days.  The pain of the lengthy bus ride was significantly alleviated by rereading Sense and Sensibility.

Thing 3: Master Class, on Broadway, starring Tyne Daly.  This is a play about Maria Callas, an opera singer about whom I knew little and cared less.  I do somewhat like opera, though, and this play made me want to see more of it.  It dragged a bit at times - there simply wasn't enough action, or enough characters, or any humor, to prevent it - but Daly's performance was incredible and usually engrossing, and it was definitely worth seeing.

Thing 4: Fifteen-mile run.  My goal was to get one of these in before my trip to Ireland, and I did, although just barely.  I was sick much of this past week (to the point of actually taking a day off work Tuesday) and, although I felt better on Friday, my evening at the theater prevented me from getting to bed as early as I'd have liked and the vestiges of my cold kept me from sleeping well.  I woke up at 5 a.m. yesterday morning, feeling okay, and after a bit of cereal and a bit of dawdling headed out to Central Park.

This was one of those runs that felt bad from the beginning, and never really got any better.  They happen.  I ran one big loop around the park - six miles - and then one loop on the upper five (comprising Harlem Hill but not the easy bottom loop).  The last part of this loop was alongside a race that was running on the lower five, and because of this race and the exhaustion that was quickly beginning to overtake me, I decided not to do my last four miles as a single loop around the 72-to-102 portion of the park but two circuits of the bottom loop.  Up until this point I had been running very slowly but had only stopped twice, at the water fountain on Harlem Hill, for refills, and although I felt very tired I had no specific complaints aside from running short of tissues.  I'd worn a shirt with longer sleeves than usual and my worst friction burns weren't acting up too much (later, I felt burning at the collar of the shirt, and my burns look pretty bad even today - but they feel way less bad than usual, probably because I can wear shirts that don't hit so high).  But things got very bad very quickly after I hit the 11-mile mark - calf spasms, thirst, general fatigue and desire to stop running at every moment.  I was taking (short) walking breaks about every five minutes by the end of the run.  When I finally finished, it was an effort to drag myself home, and I felt pretty badly for several hours.  I'm pleased that I did this before my trip (next weekend, I'll probably bike Summer Streets - for fun, and for bike practiced - instead of doing a long run) and also rather apprehensive about how I'm going to get from where I am to marathon in the next 13 weeks.

Thing 5: Alexander McQueen at the Met.  Sadly, this is something I did not do.  I had been putting it off because of the reports of huge crowds, and when I finally tried to go yesterday (this is the last weekend of the exhibit) the line was out the door.  And around the steps, snaking along the plaza, and down the block.  So I went to the Guggenheim instead and looked at rocks on pillows (weird) and a room with dollar bills covering the walls (cool).

Thing 6: Discovered an(other) awesome brunch place: Elmo, in Chelsea.  Really more of a general restaurant, but the french toast was awesome (and huge, although after yesterday's run the hugeness wasn't a problem).  It was both unique (made with raisin-walnut-cinnamon bread and topped with very good baked apples and caramel sauce) and good.  And - sadly rare in brunch places - the waiters were non-snooty and refilled my coffee without being asked, and - also rare in brunch places - the meal was actually a reasonable-even-outside-NYC price.

Agenda for this week:  several small workouts, although possibly not today.  lots of work.  book club.  start packing for my trip.