Monday, September 23, 2013

Weekly Goods

Attempting to get back in the blogging groove, here are a few highlights of last week.

A good movie...
La Misma Luna
A wonderful movie directed by Patricia Riggen about a boy and his mother.  An enticing summary can be found here. Spanish with english subtitles, so a great movie for improving your spanish language skills as well. It's also called Under the Same Sun. Watch the movie trailer for yourself.


A good song...
Pure Imagination
A hauntingly beautiful song remade by Fiona Apple. This is the song behind Chipotle's latest advertisement, The Scarecrow.

A good book...
The Thoughtful Dresser
A novel by Linda Grant taking a closer, and more serious look into our love of fashion. She intertwines many wonderful bits of fashion history, from Chanel to Christian Dior's New Look, while telling moving stories of the power of fashion and style in the face of of atrocities against humanity. Makes me like fashion even more then I did before. Quick and easy read, if you like fashion at all, this book is for you.

A good eat...
Boulevard
After making a reservation 3 weeks ago, we finally had dinner at Boulevard. If you are up for a gourmet meal, wonderful ambience and the best halibut I've ever tasted, Boulevard is where you should eat. Chef Nancy Oakes lives up to expectations, now I want to check out her other restaurant in town, Prospect.

A good talk...
ACA Town Hall Meeting 
I attended Stanford's Affordable Care Act Town Hall Meeting today. The guest speakers were Congresswoman Anna Eshoo, California Secretary of Health & Human Services Diana Dooley, and Stanford Pediatrician Paul Wise. Enrollment in "Covered California", our health insurance exchange begins next week. Thus why House Republicans are all in a fit this week. Diana Dooley did an excellent job breaking down the 3 legs of the ACA, the delivery and finance reform, prevention and wellness aspects, and expansion of coverage. My favorite quote from the event was via Anna Eshoo, "We love our history once it's been made, but we seldom embrace the fact that we're making it". Let's hope that with the bans on lifetime insurance caps and discrimination based on pre-existing conditions that health care stops being the number one cause of bankruptcy in the US.

A good run...
Palo Alto Moonlight Run
Stanford Med came out in full force, fundraising over $6k for our free clinics in honor of former Dean Phil Pizzo, aka Marathon Man and one of my idols. I entered the 5k race, and wasn't going to push myself, because I strained my calf earlier in the week (yes injuries still mar my existence). But, when the gun went off, I couldn't help myself and I went for it. The sheer joy of racing was felt in every ounce of my being. I was grinning from ear to ear for at least the first half of the run (don't worry shortly after I started to feel like I was going to die from lactic acid). Seriously though, such a joy to be out there with everyone. Racing is a spectacular feeling! Even though I was about 200 people back and took a solid 5 minutes before we were going faster than 10 min/mile pace, I somehow managed to win my age division? I didn't even know this until my advisor emailed me saying she picked up my medal for me. Sure enough, I am now in possession of a blue ribbon medal! A surprising highlight. I think I can run a pretty good 5k in the upcoming year. So here goes nothing...

Ok, first post in two months, have to start somewhere. This was certainly a good week, hopefully I"ll have something worthy of posting soon. Pass along any "goods" from your week.