Quietly Busy Weekend

Hmm, somehow I appear to done a fair number of things this weekend.

Friday: At guitar lessons I learned some new things, including blues shuffles. Remarkably easy to do and fun. So Aki came by and we played together for a while. He did some very interesting things with the harmonica (e.g. doing a guitar lead on the harp). That was a lot of fun. Need to do that again. On the way home I noticed that whenever I engaged the clutch on my car, it gave out a disturbing squeaking noise. This was especially disturbing since I just spent a ridiculous amount of money on repairs that included (among other things) replacing the clutch. Looks like another trip to the dealer in my future. Sigh.

Saturday: Got up at an unreasonable hour to drive into the dealer to have them at the clutch. After only a couple of hours they determined that the clutch cable they put in was defective and replaced it. On the bright side, I did get to see some gripping action of No Limit Holdem Poker playing on the TV at the dealership. Wow, how did the retiree guy lose when he drew two queens? Unbelievable! Almost as unbelievable as the Travel channel showing a poker championship. Well, since I was up, I figured I'd get errands done. Got tires ordered, which was necessary since I declined to get new tires as part of the aforementioned repairs ($750 for four tires? I don't think so.). Went to Best Buy (yay gift cards) where I got some CF cards for the camera. Damn, CF cards are cheap now. I got 512MB for $50 (less after rebate, assuming BB actually pays it), about a 1/4 of what I paid a couple years ago. Got groceries, made myself breakfast and then rested for a little bit before the evening's entertainment. Met Aki, Rachel, and Tim at Tanto's Japanese Restaurant over on Saratogoa Ave. Pretty good if you're down with seafood (and if you aren't... well never mind that). Then on to the Improv to see Darrell Hammond. He was pretty funny, although I couldn't tell if he was wasted or not for a while. A tad tipsy, perhaps. The impressions were great (he does such an awesome Clinton) and some of the jokes were devastating. Played some pool at South First and then off to bed.

Sunday: Got up earlier than I wanted to (but probably later than I should have) to drive into the city to try and get some System of A Down tickets. They're playing tonight and the tickets were only available at the Fillmore. Evidently I am not a big enough fan, since some of the people starting lining up around midnight on Saturday. I was about halfway there when the DJ on the radio said if you weren't already there, you probably shouldn't bother. Sigh. Oh well. I went into the city anyway since I had my camera and was going to go to Golden Gate park. I love San Francisco. Whenever I go there there's always something unusual to see. This time it was a woman, black, thin, probably in her 50s, standing in front of a bus stop at the intersection where I was stopped for a red light. I was trying to figure out why she was standing in the street bent over at the waist. Then it occurred to me that she appeared to be masturbating. In the street. At 10 am. Either that or she was trying to get a squirrel out of her pants. Did not have my camera ready, or I'd have something to share. Shook my head and drove on.

Golden Gate Park was lovely and the weather was quite pleasantly warm (yes, in SF). The main concourse where the Academy of Sciences and the De Young Museum were closed for renovations, so that was a bit disappointing. But the Japanese Tea Garden, Stryber Arboretum, and the Conservatory of Flowers were all open, so that afforded plenty of opportunities for photos and rambling. Met a couple in the Japanese Tea Garden who were having wedding pictures taken, which was cool. Took a quick nap in the Arboretum. Shot a lot of pictures, some of which are quite promising. Here are a few. Hope to get more on yahoo later.
(click for larger images)





Drove out of the city and decided to drive down Route 1 to Santa Cruz since the weather was so nice. Got stuck in traffic at Half Moon Bay (they were having an air show or an auto show or something). The coast was gorgeous. Looped northwards at Santa Cruz and headed. And then I rested.