mushinnoshin

Whew. Sleep has been had. Clothes have been unpacked and washed. Cat litter has been emptied, cat fur has been vacuumed. Groceries have been bought. Mail has been sorted and mostly read. Next step I suppose is to tackle the daunting stack of receipts and asses the damage, to figure out how many times I’m going to have to sell my body on the streets to pay for this little trip. Anyway before I do that, here’s the brief on the balance of the week:

Wednesday continued:

• Batting zeros on the sessions for the day, hopefully Mike’s having more luck. Flush cache and redirect a symlink to a big de-normalized table “replicated” over scp? That’s your plan? Really????
• Staying in tonight for some much needed recoup. Food at the hotel bar, then we killed the evening in a roundtable discussion group hashing out clusters (that engine=NDB thing). Slow joins might be a problem, we’ll see.

Thursday:

• Better sessions this morning. But next time, give You Tube all three hours. And yes, I do like my SQL spicy, thanks. Sorry we’ll have to miss the “ice cream social”.
• ALCATRAZ! (related: what does it say about us that we both put a prison high on our must-see list?)
• I checked into the Cathedral Hill, Mike checked into The Monarch. I had actually looked at the Monarch previously in my research and had it as a High Maybe. Unless Mike tells me it’s a shithole inside, that might be my choice next time, if there’s ever a next time. My place was nice, but pricey. But then, pricey did include parking, so maybe on net I got the deal.
• The. Fillmore. Fuck yeah. I’m pretty sure I saw the ghosts of Jim and Janis in the balcony, watching DJ Shadow tear it up. Sorry Alison, I would have been just as happy to see the Decemberists, but I had to see the Fillmore. Close out the night with another Thai dinner and another Irish Pub.

Friday:

• Allright mister “I don’t know where we need to go, lets just drive around the East Bay ’til we find it”, I don’t want to hear any more shit about me getting lost. We’re even : )
• “Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.” — I spent the early part of the day on a proper tour, complete with Dim Sum lunch, and spent the afternoon wandering on my own. I’m sure the racists paleos would disapprove, but some of us like salad. I wonder if Dorothy’s old tenement is for rent?
• Evening interlude at the Abode of Iyengar
• Wandered south from my hotel to Grove & found the symphony, the opera, a museum, a gallery. West to the library at Larkin, not quite to the Tenderloin — head north back to Geary and discover Little Saigon. Tasty lemongrass. But was the beer really Vietnamese? The bottle says it was made in Cali…
• Went for a cruise through Haight & Castro, but didn’t stop, didn’t want to hassle with parking and wanted to get sleep early to prep for Saturday…

Saturday:

• 8:15, arrive at the Zen Center. Today is absolutely today.
• Wander through “Lower Haight”, Page street to Duboce between Steiner and Octavia. Lunch on a panini and greens at a nondescript little cafe. No idea what it was called, it didn’t have a sign, but the food was mighty tasty.
• Woo-hoo! I fixed my camera! Now I can head back through the arts & city hall area for pictures. Then it’s off to Haight-Ashbury proper. Note to city planners: people can shop more if they don’t waste 30 minutes trying to park only to be constrained by parking meter time limits. Just sayin’.
• Mmmmm, paella…. and holy shit, wow, Cusquena Dark — Negra Modelo, you’ve been usurped.
• Finally found an internet cafe (meaning a place with terminals, not just wi-fi — for a nerd, I am remarkably laptop impaired). Why the hell don’t they list these things in the tourist guides? I could have saved a small fortune had I found one of these in Santa Clara.
• Wrap up the trip with a last night of bar hopping through Haight & Castro. As far as I know, I didn’t have anything to do with that highway collapse at 3 in the morning, but, well anything’s possible…

Sunday:

• Nurse hangover at a greasy spoon, then it’s off to the airport, and back to reality.

Allright. Time to dive into that pile of receipts. Pray for me. If I survive, I may follow up with deeper thoughts on a few high points. Almost every one of these bullets deserves a post of its own, but of course few will get one. I really do need to introduce you to Dorothy. Oh! And I’ve got pics! Time to finally make use of that Flickr account I guess.