Day 163: A Big 'ol Lie and the Big 'ol Rock

On Day 162 I purposely missed my flight back to Atlanta, something I'd never done, forcing me to lie about it as one of Day 163's things I've never done.

Before leaving for my trip, my schedule at work changed significantly, leaving me with several extra vacation days upon my return. I figured I'd rather spend those vacation days in San Francisco than Atlanta, so I attempted to change my flight before I left.

Delta would let me change my flight, but only if I paid $50, plus the price difference between the new flight and the one I'd already bought. That totaled $450.

There was no way was I going to pay that, so I looked into purchasing a one-way ticket from San Francisco to Atlanta, and again, was faced with a hefty price-tag.

I elected to not do anything about it ahead of time, and see where the weekend took me. No surprise, the weekend took me exactly where I expected it would, to not wanting to leave San Francisco.

So without any other ideas, I decided to play dumb.

I called Delta early on Day 163, took a deep breath, and then exhaled while I spit out a tirade something like, "Hi, my name is Stephanie and I'm freaking out I just drove in from Lake Tahoe and was expecting to fly back to Atlanta tonight and I just looked at my ticket and realized I booked Monday night's red-eye instead of tonight's red-eye and I can't believe that I did something so stupid and I just looked at my ticket and is there anything that you can do please I'm desperate."

Inhale.

I'm a terrible liar, but fortunately I have a flair for the dramatics, so I made sure I sounded as desperate as I possibly could.

The customer service lady was pleasant enough, but either wasn't in a position to help me or wasn't in the mood to try. She read me my options matter-of-factly: "If you want to get on tonight's flight it will cost $473. There's a flight leaving tomorrow morning at 6:30am and that one will cost you $350. Neither are cheap, but that's all I can do, I'm sorry."

I tried so hard to make myself cry, but as I've said before, crying on demand is not my forte. I whimpered, gasped, and panted instead, "Please, isn't there anything you can do? This truly was an honest mistake."

Yes, I know, another lie, but there was a mistake made here. The mistake was booking my flight through Delta who finds a way to screw me over every time.

"Well," the apathetic customer service lady sighed, "I can ask my manager if she can waive the change fee, but you'll still have to pay the difference for the flight."

I asked for her to ask her manager. Every little bit helps, I suppose.

A few minutes later, she came back to the phone sounding surprised, "Well, my manager has actually agreed to waive all of the fees for you, so if you want, I can rebook you to fly out tonight on the 10:30pm flight."

"OhmygoshthankyousomuchIreallyappreciateitIcan'tthankyouenoughI'msuchanidiotandnextime-I'llpaymoreattentionbutIreallythankyousomuch."

Shut. Up. Stephanie. Stop. Talking.

So there it is, I lied to Delta.

I am a liar.

I don't condone lying ever, but in my defense, I tried to do the right thing before resorting to these tactics, and my lie didn't hurt anyone. And now that I'm back to being honest, I think we can all agree that Delta, and every other airline for that matter, has been sticking it to us for years with luggage fees and oversold flights, so it's about time they got what was coming to them. Plus, there was plenty of room on that flight, so it's not like I took the seat from someone else.

I've changed my tune about Delta, and will sing their praises for their willingness to help me extend my vacation. That is, until they overcharge me for something, which I'm sure will happen soon.

So with a secured seat on Tuesday night's flight, I set out to enjoy my last day of vacation and make Day 163's other thing I've never done before visit Alcatraz.

When my parents brought my brother and me to San Francisco in 1990, I said before that all I remember was riding a cable car and wearing a hideous fuchsia sweater. I often wondered why we skipped Alcatraz, one of San Francisco’s most popular tourist attractions.

Though I’ve never discussed it with them, my assumption now, after having been there, is that my parents didn't take us to the world famous federal penitentiary because I was nine, and my brother was 11.

For most nine-year-olds, jail is an ambiguous place where they lock up the bad people. But Alcatraz is the real-deal. From 1934-1963, the Rock housed some of the most notorious criminals including mobster Al Capone. According to the tour, for many of the inmates transferred here, Alcatraz was the end of the line.

Though I'm not sure I would've understood that at age nine, seeing a real-deal prison might've been too much.

In order to get to Alcatraz, I took a ferry across the San Francisco Bay. The ferry ride, the fresh air, and the view all made the price of admission worth it, and I hadn't even made it to the island.

My friend Trish and her husband Mark had visited San Francisco the summer before and told me going to Alcatraz was, by far, the best thing that they did. I also remember chuckling at the pictures of the two of them at various spots along the tour with their ear phones on and the audio player around their necks, looking like the ultimate tourists.

Soon, I was just like them, completely engaged with my own audio tour, listening to former Alcatraz prison guards and prisoners share their real-life accounts of working and living on the Rock. Their stories are chilling.

I wondered about the men (and it was all men who were locked up at Alcatraz) who became imprisoned there. I wondered if their criminal behavior were kick-started by something small, like a lie to an airline, that spiraled out of control. Maybe not (it was 1934, after all), but I had to question whether or not my lie to Delta earlier in the day could be the start of a life of crime for me.

The tour of the prison starts in the shower, a big, open space where all the prisoners were forced to strip down naked to get clean. I suppose if you’ve been sentenced to any time in prison, getting naked in front of your peers is the least of your worries, but I shuddered at the thought.

The cells were much smaller than all of the other jail cells I’d ever been in, which, counting Alcatraz, totals one. I guess in all the prison nightmares I’d ever had, my cell was always much bigger. I could stand in the middle of it, stretch my arms out and touch the walls on both sides. If the showering in front of my fellow prisoners didn’t kill me, the claustrophobia of these cells most certainly would have.

The whole tour was interesting, but there are a few highlights I found most fascinating: Most of the guards and their families lived in compounds on the island right next to the inmates. One of the guards' daughters recalls hearing the inmates' activities as she would walk to school or try to go to sleep. I can't imagine growing up next to one of the most dangerous prisons in the country.

There was also an account of a the Battle of Alcatraz, one of the most violent escape attempts in the prison's history. Five people, two correctional officers and three inmates died in the uprising. Another 14 were injured.

The geography of Alcatraz worked to the prison's advantage in that escapes were nearly impossible; the chances that anyone could survive a swim across the harbor to safety are slim. I imagined the geography also worked to jack with the inmates' psyches as well. I mean, it sucks to be at a maximum security at all. But to be at a maximum security prison on an island with views of one of the most beautiful bays and cities in the country must have been the ultimate slap in the face. I found it a little unfair, though, that even through a small cloudy little window, that they got to enjoy the view at all.

Since I returned from my trip, several people have asked me if Alcatraz is scary, and I wouldn’t say I was ever scared. I mean, prisoners haven’t lived there in many years. But the place is creepy, and I imagine if the walls could talk, they’d have a whole hell of a lot to say.

My brother, who is a huge history fan, has been back to San Francisco several times since we traveled there as a family in 1990, so I text messaged him to see if he’d ever been to Alcatraz. He had not.

My response to him, and my advice to anyone with even a mild interest in history, is, “You have to go. You would love it.”

I was thankful after my brilliant performance on the phone with Delta, I wondered if I was one lie away from a lifetime of crime myself.

After I got onto the mainland, I walked down to Fisherman's Wharf, and ate some clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl. The bread was delicious, but the chowder at the Boston Sail Loft still gets my vote as the best.

I walked back to Elizabeth and Kristof's and started to feel the trip-ending anxiety that I always get when good times are ending, and reality is staring me in the face. Does everyone get this feeling, or is this an indication that I need to make a change in my real-life?

Before getting into a cab to take me to the airport, Elizabeth and Kristof helped me end my trip to the bay the same way I started it: with a lovely view of the city from the window in their apartment, a couple of glasses of red wine (purely medicinal to help me sleep on the plane), and one more generous helping of baratta (my new cheese boyfriend). Kristof, who had been overwhelmingly generous since I'd arrived actually bought me my own package of baratta to take with me back to Atlanta, but I insisted we eat it right then, not wanting to try and smuggle dairy onto an airplane.

My trip was full of things I'd never done before with old friends, and some new ones, committed to helping me reach my goal of doing 365 things I've never done before. Despite the trip-ending sadness, I had to feel good about that.

Day 162: Happy Endings

On Monday, Kristof and Elizabeth had to go back to work, so I set out to see San Francisco on foot, on my own, something I had done before.

Though I know it's not true, I started worrying that this blog had started to be less about me trying new things and more about me just doing stuff alone. True, this experience has forced me to do a lot of things that I've never done before on my own and it has shown me that solitude can be enriching. But while making me a more independent person, I'm also learning that just because I can do things by myself, doesn't mean that I necessarily want to. Companionship is important to me, and I am finding that most things in life are more fun if there is someone to share them with.

Being in San Fransisco for the second time in five months, I couldn't help but think about the last time that I was there with an unexpected travel companion, on a whirlwind tour of California. I'd be lying if I said my new circumstances didn't bum me out a little bit.

But on Day 162, I made new San Francisco memories as the thing I've never done before: I got a foot rub down in Chinatown, I saw the Fillmore music venue and ate dinner at Yabbies.

While covering some familiar San Francisco territory, my friend Myles called. If you've been around the blog for it's entirety (and if you weren't, it's ok, but you should go back to Day One and start reading), you might remember that Myles was at the wedding that I crashed on Day 49. He is an old friend who now lives in San Francisco. We had talked, ahead of the trip, about getting together for dinner when I was in town. He asked me how I was spending the day in the city.

"Well, right now I'm on my way to a spa in Chinatown to get a foot massage!" I said, triumphantly.

"Interesting, you didn't strike me as a happy-ending kind of girl," Myles said.

I laughed because Myles is hilarious and it would be like him to assume that I was going to a shady massage parlor that offers a wide array of "services," most of which I wanted no part. But then I paused, concerned for a moment that maybe that was the kind of place Elizabeth was sending me to. No way, I decided. Her place is legit. I'm not worried.

My conversation with Myles involved a few other jokes about Chinatown massage parlors, but I refused to let any of them get to me. We moved on to talk about our plans for later that night.

After a few minutes he asked me a question.

"Are you by yourself?" This conversation was getting weirder.

"Yes."

"Ok," he said, sounding almost relieved, "I would not go to that place your friend is telling you to go to."

I honestly couldn't tell if he was being serious or not. About 95 percent of my conversations with Myles involve inappropriate jokes, so to hear him seriously tell me that there was a chance the place I was going to could get raided by the INS, was concerning.

After we hung up I called Elizabeth to confirm that the idea she'd given me as thing I've never done before in San Francisco was legit and not creepy. So while I appreciated Myles' warning, I proceeded with my plan and went anyway to Ching's Chinese Medicine and Therapy for a foot massage.

Ching's was in the middle of Chinatown, which was bustling with activity. I walked through the door, which let out a very loud "Ding," to alert everyone upstairs, and within a mile radius that I was on my way. When I got to the top of the stairs, I walked into a normal-looking waiting room. I knew Elizabeth was right when she said this place was less spa-like, more ancient-Chinese medicine-like.

Less happy endings, more painful ones.

One of the ladies escorted me back to a room with two chairs, much like the spa pedicure chairs at nail salons. Only this chair sat lower to the ground, there was no tub at the bottom and I couldn't instruct it to knead my back with a remote control.

That shouldn’t have mattered, though, because Elizabeth told me that while my feet soaked, someone would come in to massage my shoulders too.

I sat in the room for a while, reading outdated issues of Shape magazine. Despite no massagers, the chair was actually quite comfortable. After several minutes had passed, a large woman entered the room awkwardly carrying a large tub full of water. She didn’t say anything, but appeared friendly and smiled a lot. She motioned for me to take my socks and shoes off and put them in her tub full of lukewarm water.

I did, and she left the room. I went back to reading my magazine.

One minute later, she returned to get started.

I can’t remember if I was looking down or what, but the second she touched my foot, I flinched, as if I wasn't expecting her to touch my feet, despite the fact that I has asked, and paid for, a foot massage.

That I chose a foot massage was all because of Elizabeth's recommendation. She sold me when she said while the ladies let your feet soak, they'll massage your shoulders too. Only I forgot that I hate to have my feet touched at all. And my lady didn't massage my shoulders.

Why I didn’t just get the full body massage, which was more or less the same price of the foot massage, I still don’t know.

My lady saved all of her energy for my feet. She grabbed my foot out of the water, held it up and glided her knuckle down its arch. It freaking hurt. Bad. But it also tickled, which confused me. How can something tickle, and be painful, at the same time?

No one ever discussed this with me (the lady and I never spoke to each other), but based on the many charts showing the pressure points of the body, I’m going to assume that the focus of their massage practice was pressure. Lots and lots of pressure.

I tried to lean back in the chair and relax, but I found myself gripping the arm rests, like white-knuckle style. The woman massaging my feet and I made eye contact several times and I thought she’d be able to read the discomfort all over my face, but she just laughed, like the women do at the nail salon when I jerk my leg back from their hands when they tickle me.

The massage lasted a half-hour, and I’d say I was relaxed for a total of seven minutes, the time she wasn’t touching my feet, but massaging my legs. My feet did feel better after she was done, but I wished I’d made a wiser decision about what kind of massage I purchased.

When I was done, my happy feet took a long walk to Fillmore Street, near where we had eaten the night before. I took my time, poking my head into several shops along the way, dodging the intermittent rain. This trip was my first experience with rainy San Francisco weather, which I had managed to avoid the last two times I'd been there. I found myself confused by the rain there, because it always seemed to downpour while the sun was still shining. The showers never seemed to last very long and the rain was friendly.

Not dark, ominous, I'm going to ruin your walk rain. Sweet, gentle, I'm here to cool you off San Francisco rain.

I walked down Fillmore until I got to the Fillmore, one of San Francisco's historic music venues. Unfortunately there were no good shows happening while I was there, but I still wanted to check it out.

Later that night, Elizabeth, Kristof, and I met Myles, who lived in the neighborhood, for dinner at Yabbies Oyster Bar. Ahead of us meeting him, Elizabeth sternly said to Kristof that we all needed to be on our best behavior at dinner. The conversations we'd been having over the weekend needed to be toned down, as we'd all reached a level of comfort with each other was one that an outsider might not be okay with.

Within five minutes of our arrival, however, after I assured him that there were no happy endings at my foot massage, Myles set the pace for inappropriate. Soon jokes were flying out of our mouths at record speed like we'd all been best friends for a lifetime. The door had been opened for an "anything goes" kind of conversation that my mom would be ashamed of, but one that I'm still laughing about.

We finished the night with a couple of drinks at a local bar, and I wasn't feeling as bummed anymore. I'd manage to get a happy ending out of this day after all, just not the kind you find at creepy massage parlors.

San Francisco on Dwellable

Day 161: Prime Real Estate

We woke Sunday morning to a beautiful day at Lake Tahoe. The sun was shining and there were only a few clouds in the bright blue sky. A perfect day for a lot of things, including driving back to San Francisco. I was bummed that we couldn't stay and ski again, convinced that with just one more day, I'd master not only the mountains, but the ski lift as well.

Several of us took a walk around Cynthia's parents' neighborhood, enjoying the sunshine and our last minutes in Tahoe. I spent some quiet moments feeling thankful for the weekend I'd just had, the new friends that I'd made, and most of all, for not killing myself on the slopes. I decided then that I wanted to make ski trips a yearly thing. I really want to be a skier.

Sometime mid-morning, we loaded into our cars and headed back to the Bay Area. I was surprised at how tired I was on our return, despite us going to bed early every night we were there. Skiing whipped me!

When we got back to Elizabeth and Kristof's, they both asked me what I wanted to do for the rest of the day. What I really wanted to do was whatever the two of them normally do on Sunday afternoons. I didn't want to disrupt their schedule just because I was in town.

Plus, Sundays, for most people, are sacred. My friend Momo and her husband, for example, have been known to outright refuse to make plans on Sundays, not wanting to jeopardize an opportunity to relax, or to spend the day doing whatever they want. They're not trying to be rude, they just want their Sundays to themselves.

It's not just Momo, though. Even the most social individuals that I know use Sundays to hide out, presumably to deal with the anxiety that their weekend transgressions might've caused. Others that I know concoct elaborate "Sunday Funday" plans, determined to soak up all 48 hours of the weekend. Regardless of how people choose to spend the day, Sundays, I know, are not to be messed with.

I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, but I knew I didn't want to make Elizabeth and Kristof run me all over town doing touristy things the day before they had to be back at work, therefore ruining their Sunday.

But Elizabeth refused to let us sit around and watch DVR'ed episodes of "Toddlers and Tiaras" or "RuPaul's Drag Race," much to my dismay. She suggested we instead capitalize on the beautiful day and take a walk on Baker Beach.

Baker Beach is a bit of a ways from Russian Hill, so we walked to catch the bus. On our way to the bus stop, we passed an apartment building in Kristof and Elizabeth's neighborhood that has some units for sale, one of which had caught Kristof’s eye a long time ago, after he'd started looking for a place to potentially buy.

"Let's go check it out," I said as we climbed the hill.

They refused, at first, not wanting to spend one of my days in San Francisco apartment hunting. But truthfully, I couldn’t have been more excited. I love real estate (is that weird?), and though not actively looking to buy a home, I’ve been known to go "house-hunting" in Atlanta from time to time with my real estate agent friends. I like to see how houses are laid out and I like considering how I'd renovate or decorate them if they were my own. As evident by some of the homes I've viewed, I also like to see what kind of freaks I have living in my neighborhood. There are a lot.

Anyway, the opportunity to use this beautiful day to look at some big city real estate was as much for me and my curiosity as it was for Elizabeth and Kristof trying to find a place to live.


Day 161's thing I've never done before was to go apartment hunting in San Francisco and take an X-rated walk on Baker Beach.


A nice, relatively young guy met us at the door when we entered the apartment building and then he took us up on the elevator to the unit.

San Francisco real estate, like a lot of other big cities, is expensive. I'm not sure how it stacks up to places like New York, Boston, or Los Angeles, but I've visited enough friends in these places to understand that we were going to be dealing with big prices and small spaces.

The apartment we viewed was on the 7th or 8th floor, I think, and though I have no concept of how many square feet it was, it was a two bedroom, one bathroom place with a living area, dining room, kitchen and terrace. I think it cost near $800,000. That's a lot of money anywhere, but it's San Francisco, so I wasn't terribly surprised that a place so small cost so much. I was astounded, however, that they would ask that much for this place.

First of all, the apartment was dirty. Don't most people that are trying to sell their house spend a great deal of time keeping the house neat and tidy in case potential buyers decide to stop in unexpectedly for a viewing? Whoever lived in this space looks like they packed their things in the middle of the night and left town without telling anyone. I would have assumed that the things left behind, the creepy, antique-looking paintings, broken dishes and dusty mirrors, would have been removed by the company hired to sell the place.

Not to mention, the apartment was in need of some serious updates. The kitchen alone needed a makeover to bring it out of the 1970s time warp. The bathroom was the size of a half bathroom with a shower, suited only for individuals less than six feet tall.

The worst part of the apartment was that the view the real estate company had advertised was not existent. Not from this apartment anyway.

While we milled around the place, the nice gentleman who had greeted us downstairs left and was replaced a woman. An all-business, judgmental, not nice real estate agent who took one look at us and either assumed there was no way any of us could afford a place like this, or simply was a bitch and didn't want to help us.

To be fair, I couldn't afford this place, but she didn't know that, and how dare she assume.

Kristof became suspicious, after checking out the view, that the apartment we were in was not the one he was interested in viewing. After going back and forth with this rude lady, we came to the conclusion that the apartment he wanted to see was either not for sale anymore, or this lady just didn't want to show it to us.

She also didn't want us to show ourselves out, so she escorted us onto the elevator, with her client in tow and personally showed us the door.

Elizabeth doesn't tolerate rudeness of this magnitude, so even if she and Kirstof had loved that apartment, I could see her refusing to buy it on account of that woman sucking. Words of wisdom to real estate agents in San Francisco: Do not cross Elizabeth.

We caught the bus to take us as far as we could go, and then we walked the rest of the way to Baker Beach. I recognized the view immediately. This is the spot that countless pictures of San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge with the white capped waves crashing against the rocks beneath have been taken. The view was spectacular, and I was surprised I hadn't made an effort to enjoy it on my other trips to San Francisco.

We walked towards the bridge, fighting the wind that was blowing wildly and the weird foam that was blowing in off the waves. As we approached the bridge, Kristof turned to me, slyly smiling, and said, "Now this is the naturalist part of Baker Beach."

I smiled and nodded, unsure exactly of what he meant by "naturalist" in this context. Luckily, I didn't have to wonder very long. When I looked up towards the bridge I saw a tall man, likely in his 60's, standing as naked as the day he as born.

Elizabeth turned to me, "This is the naked part of the beach."

Clearly.

Sure enough, the beach's website even says, "The northernmost part of Baker Beach is frequented by clothing-optional sunbathers."

Though I don't particularly enjoy being naked myself, I understand the freedom people feel without clothes on, and I loved that these men were embracing the nudist lifestyle. What confused me though, was that I didn't find the weather to be suitable for nakedness. The wind was brisk and though the sun was shining brightly, I certainly wouldn't have wanted to be in a bikini out there, much less in my birthday suit.

Is nudity weather-proof? Like, if you like to be naked in public, does it not matter that it's cold outside? Clearly this man, and his friend, who was also naked but sitting down, were not bothered by the cool wind.

After we left our naked friends we walked through some other parts of the Presidio, a National Park of which Baker Beach is a part. For 200 years the area served as a military post for three different armies. Now it boasts some of the city's most beautiful views and wooded areas. We walked through the greenspace, passing the Presidio golf course, talking about the 1990 San Francisco earthquake.

There was some discussion when we left the Presidio as to where we should go for dinner. Should we pick up dinner and take it back to the house to watch the Oscars, or should we just eat at the restaurant and then return to the house to watch them? I love it when these are the biggest decisions that I have to make.

The discussion lasted for a while, long enough for us to walk through some of the nicest, most exclusive neighborhoods in San Francisco near the Presidio. We tested our limits to see how long we could linger by someone's yard, checking our their view or staring into their windows.

We talked about what we were going to do and how we were going to get there to do it so long that we ended up just walking all the way to Pizzeria Delfina. We arrived starving and had already decided during our afternoon-long walk, that we deserved to eat whatever, and as much as we wanted.

So, we did, starting with more more baratta (my favorite cheese ever in life), meatballs, and fried cauliflower. The idea was to order a lot of food so that we could take whatever we didn't eat back to Elizabeth and Kristof's, but that didn't happened. We polished off all of the appetizers and two entrees (a pork dish and a pizza) right there.

Since I hadn't eaten since breakfast,I could've eaten anything at that point, but I'm so glad we were eating here. The restaurant was bustling with activity and the food was wonderful.

Besides the baratta, my other favorite thing about the restaurant was the wait staff's t-shirts. The owner of Delfina, concerned about the negative (and sometimes untrue) reviews his restaurant was getting on Yelp.com decided to confront his critics head-on and have the one-star review comments printed on his staff's t-shirts.

Some of the t-shirts said:

"This place sucks."

"The pizza was sooo greasy, I'm assuming this was in part due to the pig fat."

"The service was bitchy."

Damn, this is a good idea. I wish people were also forced to wear their worst reviews on their clothing. My t-shirt might say:

"Shares a little bit too much. Could stand to be a little more aloof."

"Can be flaky at times. Spreads herself too thinly."

"Tends to be sensitive. She shouldn't dish it out if she can't take it."

What would yours say?

After dinner we took a cab back to Elizabeth and Kristof's to settle in to watch the Oscars that Elizabeth had taped. We started with the red carpet walks, judging everyone's outfits before getting to the real show.

A couple of hours into our viewing party, Elizabeth attempted, as she had all evening, to fast forward through some of the commercials. Only in an accidental, but hilarious turn of events, the DVR fast forward button got away from her, and she skipped ahead to the end, revealing to all of us that Hurt Locker had seemingly won the award for Best Picture. Frantic get back to where we were, she reversed. This time, the rewind stopped for us to, again, accidentally, see Sandra Bullock accepting her award for Best Actress.

"Agh, make it stop!" Elizabeth yelled, throwing the remote at Kristof. Elizabeth likes the DVR remote about as much as I like ski lifts, apparently, previously and by accident, erasing the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics.

I was hysterically laughing, considering we'd been suffering through the music tributes, the awards for animated short films and light direction, just to make sure we didn't cheat ourselves of the full Oscar experience. When, thanks to a tricky remote, we were able to, within 30 seconds, get all the answers that we really wanted anyway.

Elizabeth felt bad for destroying the build-up and ruining the ending, but I wasn't mad at all. In fact, I was grateful. DVR is a beautiful thing.

We jumped around to learn who won the other "big" awards and quickly put our Tahoe weekend, the Oscars, and ourselves, to bed.

Day 40: Drinking is Fun, Until it's Not

We woke up in San Francisco with one full day to hang out before catching our flight to Boston. We remained on the no-agenda agenda. "Whatever!" was our motto. So we took off on foot to explore the city.

I had visited San Francisco the previous summer, so I left it up to Mountain Man to decide what he wanted to see and do, hoping that one of those things was something I'd never done before.

Before we left for the trip, Mountain Man casually mentioned his sister had just returned from San Francisco and had enjoyed Irish coffees at a place called The Buena Vista. He sort of threw it out there as an idea, not at all set on really finding the place. I had never heard of it, so I planned to ask Elizabeth about it later. And then lo and behold, we turned the corner to make our way towards Fisherman's Wharf, and there it was.

The Buena Vista. Irish Coffees before noon. Score!

Serendipitous occurrences like this never happen to me, so I assumed it had to be Mountain Man. Perhaps that's why he abandoned his phone at Phish and just assumed we would bump into each other. Maybe stumbling upon places like The Buena Vista just happens to him.

I wonder if he also stumbles upon winning lottery tickets and designer shoes. If so, I might have to keep him around.

Mountain Man is Irish. I am not, but I look like I could be. Maybe it was the luck of the Irish, and those who look like they are.

Whatever it was, we felt like it was fate to belly up to the bar and make Day 40's thing I've never done before enjoy Irish Coffees at The Buena Vista in San Francisco.

The Buena Vista claims to have served America's first Irish coffee back in 1952. Back then, the owner of the Buena Vista challenged an international writer to help him recreate the "Irish Coffee" served at the Shannon Airport in Ireland. The two worked tirelessly, but they finally perfected their recipe, bringing the drink to the United States.

www.thebuenavista.com/irishcoffee.html

We weren't really aware of the story or the significance of the Buena Vista, but we definitely enjoyed our Irish Coffee breakfast. When we were done, we walked through Fisherman's Wharf to meet Elizabeth for lunch at the Ferry Building.

It was here where I was able to separate from Mountain Man long enough to explain to Elizabeth who he was and how we ended up on this trip together. I only had the time it took for Mountain Man to pick up his lunch and talk to his dad on the phone, so the story was brief. But Elizabeth seemed satisfied and we all enjoyed our food.

After lunch, we left Elizabeth and continued on to explore Alamo Square (where the Tanners from Full House lived) and then down Haight and Ashbury Streets (where the Grateful Dead lived). We ended up at Golden Gate Park, where I was asked to buy drugs at least twice (not the first time this had ever happened) and where I was reminded of one of the many reasons why I love San Francisco so much. I love that Mountain Man and I sat down on a bench and watched grade school kids at soccer practice while hearing hippies in a drum circle behind us. I call that diversity.

The plan was to meet Elizabeth and Kristof for drinks before we caught our plane to Boston, but we had a little bit of time before they got off work, so we did what any self-respecting San Francisco vacationer would do...we went to Happy Hour in the Haight.

Haight Street is a pretty popular one in San Francisco, full of locally owned stores, restaurants and bars. This is the area where the hippie movement began in San Francisco. It is also where Mountain Man and I had our first fight.

My mom always told me that nothing good happens after midnight. This was her justification for my 11:30pm curfew in high school. And although she's never said it, I'm sure that she also thinks that nothing good happens after an Irish Coffee and four beers. I think she's right.

To call the next few hours dramatic would be an understatement. The walk back to the trolley was long and was interrupted several times by our "discussions" in the street. We finally got to Elizabeth and Kristof and somehow managed put on the performance of our lifetimes. I hardly ever see her and I didn't want to make the last couple of hours uncomfortable for anyone. Saying goodbye to Elizabeth is always sad; compounded with everything else and I just about lost it on the streets of San Francisco.

Then we picked up our luggage, and raced to the airport, allowing the cab driver to experience round two (or was it three) of our "discussions." We were mad, sad, and drunk. I've never slept so good on a plane in my life. I guess there always is a silver lining.

Day 39: Back on the Train

Since Mountain Man entered into the scene, there is has been a renewed interest in the blog. So I feel compelled to tell you that, yes, things were going just fine. Everyone was still getting along. The trip was still fun. No, you cannot see a picture of Mountain Man.

Wednesday morning, we had to make some decisions about the next couple of days of our trip. There were still some places that CK wanted to show us and that we wanted to see in Yosemite. Our only real deadline was to get to San Francisco by Thursday night because we were taking the red-eye to Boston.

Do we stay in Yosemite for another day and night and have CK drive us to San Francisco on Thursday? Do we leave Wednesday night and try and spend some time in San Francisco? For Team Temecula, not knowing the answers to these seemingly important vacation questions would have been a complete nightmare. For us, though, it was pretty standard.

We were Team Whatever.

Do want a beer? Sure, whatever.

How are we going to get from Yosemite to San Francisco? I don't know, whatever.

Your shirt is on fire. Really? Whatever.

We were just happy to be there. What. Ever.

CK had been so accommodating and such a great tour guide that the thought of him driving us three hours to San Francisco only to turn around and drive back did not sit well with Mountain Man or me. But I left it up to Mountain Man to make the final decision because a.) I really didn't care and b.) I'm a Libra and we are horrible decision makers. If he'd left it up to me I'd probably still be there, weeks later, weighing the pros and cons.

Finally Mountain Man decided that we would spend the morning in Yosemite and then take the train to San Francisco Wednesday afternoon. Day 39 was another full day of things I'd never done before: see trees big enough to drive your car through, ride an Amtrak train to San Francisco, eat a vegetarian burrito prepared in a truck and ride on the back of a scooter.

My parents told me that I had actually seen Redwoods before, when I was 11 and our family took a trip to San Francisco. But all I remember about that trip was riding on a cable car and the hideous fuchsia cardigan I rocked in just about every picture.

Seeing the sequoias in Yosemite was different. Usually when I see something as an adult that I've seen before as a child, it always seems smaller and less impressive. Not the case with the sequoias. Even though I was bigger, the trees seemed so much grander and more beautiful. Once again, CK's knowledge of the area came shining through as we hiked (not walked, hiked) the Tuolumne Grove of Giant Sequoias. We saw the Dead Giant, a tree that is 29.5 feet in diameter. Back in 1878 a tunnel was cut into the tree, and visitors could pay a dollar to pass through on their way to Yosemite Valley.

I pay 50 cents to drive in and out of Atlanta on Georgia 400 and there isn't any fun tree to drive through. They should change that.

We also came upon a sequoia that had fallen years ago. This tree was so big and hollowed out that it was possible to walk/crawl through it. Mountain Man made it the whole way, but about halfway in I started to feel like I was in the Spider Cave again, so I quickly found an exit.

We left Tuolumne Grove and headed back to CK's house to load up our stuff and head to Merced, where we would catch the train to San Francisco. We wanted to give ourselves plenty of time to stop and pick up a burrito from Ramon, a Mexican man who makes and sells food out of a truck he parks at a convenience store. CK said it's one of the best burritos he's ever had and everytime he drives to Merced to go to the grocery store or whatever, he stops and picks one up.

I love experiences like these. I love that if I was alone and had stopped at that convenience store and saw that burrito truck, there is little to no chance that I would have bought and eaten something made in it. But thanks to CK and his infinite wisdom about Yosemite and the surrounding cities, we knew it was worth it to get Ramon to whip us up three veggie burritos. CK would enjoy his on the way home to Yosemite while Mountain Man and I would enjoy ours on the train to San Francisco.

That is, of course, if we didn't miss the train, which quickly became a possibility after Ramon decided to take extra time giving these three burritos extra special attention.

Once we had the burritos and we were back in the car, CK assured us that the train station was not far from where we were and that we'd definitely make it on time. I was relieved, until I watched a train whiz right past us on the tracks that ran parallel to the road we were on.

And then I saw something that I had never seen before in the 72 hours that I had known him. Cool, calm, and always collected CK was nervous.

I've only experienced a handful of truly low points in life, but missing a train because I stopped to buy a burrito from a truck parked at a convenience store certainly would have had to be added to the list. What's that number to Jenny Craig again?

Thankfully, we did not miss the train. We made it in plenty of time. There was no long drawn out goodbye with CK though. We hugged him, thanked him and quickly stowed our luggage and took our seat. CK told us to sit on the second story of the train because it had the best view. And it did. Unfortunately, however, the sun set half an hour after we left and for the next three hours there wasn't a whole lot to see.

But we were one cart from the bar, so Mountain man and I sipped beers, ate our burritos (which were well worth the stress of almost missing the train), and did something neither of us had ever done before: hung out together. Just the two of us. And everyone else on the train.

No surprise, there was plenty of people-watching to enjoy on our four-hour ride. I always try and make up stories about the people I see. Like the middle-aged gentleman who carried five or six plastic grocery bags on to the train. Some might have assumed he doesn't own any luggage. I assumed his estranged wife stole his luggage because she found out he was cheating on her. He was forced to pack the few belongings she didn't destroy into plastic grocery bags and get on the quickest train out of town.

I wonder if the other people looked at Mountain Man and me and knew our story. "Oh yeah, those two recently met, but they seem to be getting along and they're on their way to meet up with her friend Elizabeth for dinner."

I had texted Elizabeth that we were getting on a train and would be in San Francisco Wednesday night.

"What? What train? I'm so confused," she texted back.

Like most people, Elizabeth had no idea who Mountain Man is or what we were doing there together. She didn't even know there was a train from Yosemite to San Francisco. But that's what's so awesome about her. She'd meet me whenever and wherever (even at 9pm on a Wednesday night). Why I was there and who I was there with were all secondary to the fact that I was there.

Elizabeth's motto: Hang out first, ask questions later.

Only there would be no opportunity for questions, because Mountain Man is also a camel, and doesn't take bathroom breaks. No chance to explain.

After dinner, Elizabeth's boyfriend Kristof took me for a ride on his scooter through the hilly streets of San Francisco. Actually it was just one block, but it was still a ride. What a great way to commute! If I didn't think I would kill myself or others riding one through Atlanta traffic, I might look into trading my SUV for my very own scooter.

On the other hand, I also realized, based on these pictures I feel obligated to share, that I look overweight wearing a helmet. Seriously, it sounds like a joke, "Does this helmet make my butt look big?" But in this case, the answer is no joke. Yes, it does. And your face and arms too.

I'm blame it on the burrito.