Sonia – HOES runner up
Eyes on the Prize
Recently, at long last, I had lunch with Sonia. She was the last contestant to drop out during my first HOES victory. While we were both still in contention, we promised each other that whoever won would take the loser out for pizza. So now, 18 months after my first victory, I finally made good on my promise.
Sonia mistakenly took her hand off the sub 7.5 hours into the competition, leaving me the winner. Which was a good thing, because she was in it to win it. I was doing the pee-pee dance HARDCORE and still had 2.5 hours left until the first bathroom break.
She planned on competing this past year, and brought tons of clothes and supplies, but one of the owners told her it started half an hour after it actually did, so when she got there it was too late. I woulda been super pissed at Home Slice, but she doesn’t hold a grudge. The owner who messed up apologized later and gave her a $50 gift certificate. She still comes in once a week; she really loves Home Slice.
Sonia is really nice, I enjoyed getting to know her during the contest. She’s a graduate student in something related to Spanish rhetoric. I don’t really know much about it, but she does. Sonia just moved back to Austin from San Marcos, and will be here for a bit before going to Spain to either research, work, party or some combination thereof. She lamented not being there for Spain’s world cup victory, but still maintains that it was one of the happiest days of her life.
She wanted me to pick out the toppings, and she was even excited by the anchovies. In Spain, she ate anchovies marinated in vinegar. She liked both. We ordered anchovies, garlic, basil and a whole bunch of veggies.
Sonia plans on competing this year, and she’ll be a force of unstoppable standing-with-a-hand-on-a-sub. Mark the waiter psyched me out last time with rumors of yoga teacher and ex-Israeli commando competitors, but a prepared, on-time Sonia is as formidable as any of them. More real, too.
Cost: $29.50
Total this year: $987
