Monday January 26, 2004: sweetness follows
So, when we were all at MT for Christmas, Ryan announced that we were going to San Francisco in January.
He had a bunch of points from one of his credit cards that were about to expire, so he said, "Hey, I'll get us all hotel rooms with these points, and we can fly down to SF and eat at some of my favorite places!" This sounded like an excellent idea, and I love SF, so I was all over it.
Several weeks and lots of planning later, Storm and Jen and Laura and Bryan and I were trundling off to the airport very early on Saturday morning in order to meet Ryan and Amy and Ryan's friend Steve at the airport. We got there about ten minutes before the Ryan contingent did, and then we checked in for our flight, went through security, and zipped off to our gate. Several of us decided that we wanted to go to Starbucks, which was at the end of the D terminal, so we took a walk and got our caffeine.
Caffeine makes everything better. Really.
So we got on the plane. And stayed on the plane. It's been forever and a day since I flew into SFO, so I forgot that planes going into it are almost always late; they held us for an hour in Seattle and then once we got there we circled for twenty minutes before they let us land. Finally, they let us off the plane, and away we went to catch BART into the city.
The last time I was in SF, they were about to start running BART straight to the airport; I'm happy to say that the new spur line that goes to the airport works like a charm. Half an hour later, we were at the Montgomery station, and then started making the trek up the hill to the hotel.
We'd see a lot of that hill in the next 36 hours.
The hotel was the San Francisco Ritz-Carlton; quite possibly the nicest hotel I'll ever stay in. At this point, we split up into two groups; Bryan and Laura and I went off in one direction and had sushi and walked along Stockton, and the rest went and wandered Chinatown for a few hours.
I like Stockton St.; for me, it's the side of Chinatown that a lot of people never see--the weird produce, the barbecue shops, the crowds of people. I wanted to take some pictures, but the light wasn't particularly good--the fog had started to roll in, leaving everything kind of looking washed-out and shadowless. Laura was following me through the crowds, and I was evidently phasing through objects, which she kept almost running into.
We wandered back to the hotel and took naps. I was dozing at once point, curled up against Laura, and listening to the sounds of the street floating up through the open window. A few blocks off, St. Mary's struck the hour, and I remember thinking that this was one of those perfect moments, in one of my favorite cities in the world with two of my favorite people in the world.
Eventually, we all met back up to go down to North Beach for dinner. The Stinking Rose was...quite the experience. I'm glad that all of us really like garlic. I had very tasty chicken, and there were truffles and *really* good saltwater taffy from a chocolate shop up the street for dessert. (We had dessert before dinner. Life is short.)
We wandered down to City Lights; I'd never been there, but I immediately recognized the parts that Prairie Lights in Iowa City was based on. They did a good job of capturing the feel of the place--quirky bookstore with an interesting selection. Evidently, they put the science fiction section between Cooking and Travel, perhaps under the assumption that science fiction's about exotic cultures where they eat interesting things. Or something.
We cabbed back to the hotel and crashed. Eventually.
The next morning, we all met up in the lobby, my friend Tasha coming over from her house to meet everyone before we went to brunch. It was good to see her--it's just not a trip to the city without at least saying hi to Tasha. We walked down the hill to the station, looking at a pretty church on the way, and Tasha took the MUNI train back to West Portal while we caught BART. We made our way to Berkeley after a misadventure with my BART ticket. I had been shocking people all weekend long, and I evidently demagnetized my BART ticket somewhere along the way. Oops. I finally got trip vouchers from the nice lady in the ticket booth, and we were on our way to Ashby.
The place we went for brunch is a Buddhist temple that does a Thai brunch every Sunday. Ryan insisted that the mango sticky rice was the bomb, so I decided to try that--and am I ever glad I did. YUM. A dollop of regular rice, with a generous helping of black sweet rice, with coconut milk poured over it and freshly cut mango over the top. (Mango happens to be one of my favorite fruits ever.) I also had a very yummy but very greasy piece of bread fried in oil that I cannot for the life of me remember the proper name of. The outdoor brunch was crowded, and I stuck close to the one person who'd been there before because of that. We finally all managed to meet up on the lawn outside the temple, fortunately.
The weather had taken a turn for the beautiful, and I closed my eyes and simply enjoyed the sunshine for a little bit. I keep forgetting that I'm somewhat solar-powered, and that I should really plan on going somewhere sunny every February or so, to keep myself sane.
Back to SF, where some of us gathered our bags and some of us went and did some last-minute shopping in Chinatown. I went for bags and then hung out with Laura and Ryan at the Starbucks across the way from the Chinatown gate for a half hour. After that, we zipped on down to the BART station and went back to the airport, breezing through security. The flight back was uneventful, which is exactly how I like my airplane flights, thank you.
I got home about 9:30ish, put together pictures of the weekend, and crashed.
San Francisco for me is that girl you'll always love enough to die for but not necessarily enough to live for. It feels sort of but not exactly like coming home. It's one of my favorite places on the planet, but I doubt I'll ever live there--I could have, when i was younger and more tolerant of annoyances, but now I don't think I could. I like smaller cities, more manageable distances, and San Francisco is too far away from truly wild country.
I stood naked in the window of the hotel room and looked at the stars.
Hello, city.
I'm almost over the cold that completely flattened me last week. I didn't run or otherwise work out, in large part because I was so exhausted that getting to work under my own steam was almost too much for me. It was a weird virus I had; it turned coldlike, but for the first five days I was just super, super exhausted, cranky, and achy.
I'm better now, aside from my sinuses giving me trouble. I ran about half my regular route today, and went to Curves; I'll do the same tomorrow. If i'm feeling better by Thursday, i'll give the whole three miles a shot.
And on Friday, there will be a Bryan and Katy birthday dinner, and quite possibly laundry.
I know, my life is exciting. Well, it is if you're *me*.
Speaking of, bed calls. Night, everyone.
But before I go, Random Cute Cat Picture!
He had a bunch of points from one of his credit cards that were about to expire, so he said, "Hey, I'll get us all hotel rooms with these points, and we can fly down to SF and eat at some of my favorite places!" This sounded like an excellent idea, and I love SF, so I was all over it.
Several weeks and lots of planning later, Storm and Jen and Laura and Bryan and I were trundling off to the airport very early on Saturday morning in order to meet Ryan and Amy and Ryan's friend Steve at the airport. We got there about ten minutes before the Ryan contingent did, and then we checked in for our flight, went through security, and zipped off to our gate. Several of us decided that we wanted to go to Starbucks, which was at the end of the D terminal, so we took a walk and got our caffeine.
Caffeine makes everything better. Really.
So we got on the plane. And stayed on the plane. It's been forever and a day since I flew into SFO, so I forgot that planes going into it are almost always late; they held us for an hour in Seattle and then once we got there we circled for twenty minutes before they let us land. Finally, they let us off the plane, and away we went to catch BART into the city.
The last time I was in SF, they were about to start running BART straight to the airport; I'm happy to say that the new spur line that goes to the airport works like a charm. Half an hour later, we were at the Montgomery station, and then started making the trek up the hill to the hotel.
We'd see a lot of that hill in the next 36 hours.
The hotel was the San Francisco Ritz-Carlton; quite possibly the nicest hotel I'll ever stay in. At this point, we split up into two groups; Bryan and Laura and I went off in one direction and had sushi and walked along Stockton, and the rest went and wandered Chinatown for a few hours.
I like Stockton St.; for me, it's the side of Chinatown that a lot of people never see--the weird produce, the barbecue shops, the crowds of people. I wanted to take some pictures, but the light wasn't particularly good--the fog had started to roll in, leaving everything kind of looking washed-out and shadowless. Laura was following me through the crowds, and I was evidently phasing through objects, which she kept almost running into.
We wandered back to the hotel and took naps. I was dozing at once point, curled up against Laura, and listening to the sounds of the street floating up through the open window. A few blocks off, St. Mary's struck the hour, and I remember thinking that this was one of those perfect moments, in one of my favorite cities in the world with two of my favorite people in the world.
Eventually, we all met back up to go down to North Beach for dinner. The Stinking Rose was...quite the experience. I'm glad that all of us really like garlic. I had very tasty chicken, and there were truffles and *really* good saltwater taffy from a chocolate shop up the street for dessert. (We had dessert before dinner. Life is short.)
We wandered down to City Lights; I'd never been there, but I immediately recognized the parts that Prairie Lights in Iowa City was based on. They did a good job of capturing the feel of the place--quirky bookstore with an interesting selection. Evidently, they put the science fiction section between Cooking and Travel, perhaps under the assumption that science fiction's about exotic cultures where they eat interesting things. Or something.
We cabbed back to the hotel and crashed. Eventually.
The next morning, we all met up in the lobby, my friend Tasha coming over from her house to meet everyone before we went to brunch. It was good to see her--it's just not a trip to the city without at least saying hi to Tasha. We walked down the hill to the station, looking at a pretty church on the way, and Tasha took the MUNI train back to West Portal while we caught BART. We made our way to Berkeley after a misadventure with my BART ticket. I had been shocking people all weekend long, and I evidently demagnetized my BART ticket somewhere along the way. Oops. I finally got trip vouchers from the nice lady in the ticket booth, and we were on our way to Ashby.
The place we went for brunch is a Buddhist temple that does a Thai brunch every Sunday. Ryan insisted that the mango sticky rice was the bomb, so I decided to try that--and am I ever glad I did. YUM. A dollop of regular rice, with a generous helping of black sweet rice, with coconut milk poured over it and freshly cut mango over the top. (Mango happens to be one of my favorite fruits ever.) I also had a very yummy but very greasy piece of bread fried in oil that I cannot for the life of me remember the proper name of. The outdoor brunch was crowded, and I stuck close to the one person who'd been there before because of that. We finally all managed to meet up on the lawn outside the temple, fortunately.
The weather had taken a turn for the beautiful, and I closed my eyes and simply enjoyed the sunshine for a little bit. I keep forgetting that I'm somewhat solar-powered, and that I should really plan on going somewhere sunny every February or so, to keep myself sane.
Back to SF, where some of us gathered our bags and some of us went and did some last-minute shopping in Chinatown. I went for bags and then hung out with Laura and Ryan at the Starbucks across the way from the Chinatown gate for a half hour. After that, we zipped on down to the BART station and went back to the airport, breezing through security. The flight back was uneventful, which is exactly how I like my airplane flights, thank you.
I got home about 9:30ish, put together pictures of the weekend, and crashed.
San Francisco for me is that girl you'll always love enough to die for but not necessarily enough to live for. It feels sort of but not exactly like coming home. It's one of my favorite places on the planet, but I doubt I'll ever live there--I could have, when i was younger and more tolerant of annoyances, but now I don't think I could. I like smaller cities, more manageable distances, and San Francisco is too far away from truly wild country.
I stood naked in the window of the hotel room and looked at the stars.
Hello, city.
I'm almost over the cold that completely flattened me last week. I didn't run or otherwise work out, in large part because I was so exhausted that getting to work under my own steam was almost too much for me. It was a weird virus I had; it turned coldlike, but for the first five days I was just super, super exhausted, cranky, and achy.
I'm better now, aside from my sinuses giving me trouble. I ran about half my regular route today, and went to Curves; I'll do the same tomorrow. If i'm feeling better by Thursday, i'll give the whole three miles a shot.
And on Friday, there will be a Bryan and Katy birthday dinner, and quite possibly laundry.
I know, my life is exciting. Well, it is if you're *me*.
Speaking of, bed calls. Night, everyone.
But before I go, Random Cute Cat Picture!
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