Happy Civil Rights Day

It's a beautiful day in my neighborhood.

the worst thing about taking trips--
no matter how short or long--
is coming home.
I mean...it's the best part, too, but...
it's the anti-climactic part of it, I guess.
I just wanted to stay there, sleeping late and snuggling all morning.
we really had a great time.

I flew in, through blue skies on friday.
we went back to the hotel so I could ditch my stuff,
then we headed out to find a restaurant which was recommended.
we spent nearly 2 hours looking for it, and not only did we never find that restaurant...
but we failed to even stumble across anything else!
it was truly bizarre.
like being in The Twilight Zone--
dying of starvation in the middle of a city, and with a wad of money in your pocket.
crazy.
well, to be fair, we were not in san fransisco--
i imagine we would have had better luck there.
we were in a smaller town a little south of there, where my husband's company is located.
(still over-populated, though)
at one point we even stopped at our hotel to ask for recommendations.
the non-english speaking front desk chick handed him a brochure with some restaurants in it.
it proved highly unhelpful.
finally after much swearing and many u-turns,
we returned to the hotel and found a cheap/not great chinese place right around the corner.
ugh.
it was, though, the ONLY restaurant we had seen all night.
so the weekend started on a somewhat down note, but we had fun with it.

saturday morning we headed for the Muir Forest--Redwoods!
I doubt that my words could convey the majestic beauty,
and my photos will not even come close to capturing their grandeur.
but i'll post 'em anyway.
it was well worth the drive--
part of which took us over the Golden Gate Bridge, which I've always wanted to see.
also very beautiful.
we then headed to downtown San Fransisco and The Fisherman's Wharf.
it was...
very crowded and touristy--
and i'm not sure why i was surprised.
it was fun, though.
we did a little souvenir shopping and had some decent seafood.
we opted against the Alcatrez tour because we had heard it was boring--
it looked tough out there in the harbor, though.

then we went to meet whitey for beer and pool.
we got lost, but so did he.
on our way there, an ENORMOUS pickup truck was stopped next to us at a light, and asked for directions to the same street we were looking for...
we sorta pretended to know, then they drove off.
UTAH plates.
it made me giggle.
(we saw them later at the bar; they live about 4 miles from us)
it was a nice quiet place, and we had a great time.
I learned that Whitey knows how to shoot some pretty mean pool,
and used to be even better.
It was really great to have met my first "internet" acquaintence, in person,
and to have it go so well.
thanks, whitey, for not being a psycho.
it was very cool of mr. white to make the 15 mile/2 hour trip to come see us--
that was a california traffic joke, for those of you who aren't familiar...
this is awkward...i want to go on and on about how much fun it was, and how cool he is, etc.
but i feel self-concious.
so i'll leave it at that.
I have pictures, too.
of course, they're on a cell phone, and i have no idea how to get them off, so i'll post them when/if i figure it out.

sunday we just stayed in bed until it was time to go to the airport, in the afternoon.
it was a completely grand and glorious weekend.
for a two day trip, i'd say it was just about right.

just made me miss the husband, though.
(4 more days til he's back)
also, i b'lieve i wore him out...
he's still walking funny today, he says...
oops.
hey! i had to get my money's worth, right?
er.
well, it's his money, but, whatever.
he sure got HIS money's worth.
bleh.
i think i ruined that joke.