SwimFinsSF

A weekend away

I’m VERY inclined to fill my weekends with random chores and other silly stuff if i’m not careful but this weekend Kevin conned me into escaping the city and it was SO NICE. Saturday morning we got up and went to Golden Gate Park to buy some succulents from the botanical gardens ( If you’ve never been you NEED to go – I always forget how beautiful those gardens are – its AMAZING ). After that we grabbed brunch at Tin Pan, threw some clothes in a bag, and piled in the car.. We really didn’t have any destination – just wanted to get out of town.

We started out by driving over the Golden Gate Bridge and off toward Napa. Skipped Napa to avoid the tourists and headed through Glenn Ellen and past the Gaige House Inn (didn’t stay there this time but if you’ve got a chance check it out – we stayed there a while back and LOVED it)… Then we headed out toward and through Santa Rosa ( Kevin had never seen it and seemed to want to for some reason 😉 ) and out toward the Russian River. We drove from Santa Rosa, through Sebastapol, Guerneville, and out to the ocean at Jener.

At that point we decided we should find a place to relax for the night – unfortunately we also discovered that reservations on a sunny weekend in the bay area are usually a pretty good thing. So we headed back toward Guerneville (which, for those who have never been, is the closest thing SF has to Fire Island – kind of a strange small town that the gay boys take over on a regular basis – always funny to watch the small town locals react to the gay city boys )… Kevin wasn’t much for a ‘gay scene’ for a hotel so we steered clear of Fifes and, after a little exploring around we endid up staying at a place called Retreat Resort and Spa. Was still a gay place but little more upscale and not quite the ‘scene’ that Fifes can be.

This morning we woke up, had some coffee and a danish, then headed out toward the coast. Decided to head back toward the coast and drive down highway 1 to the city. Drove back to Jenner, through Bodega Bay, Point Reyes, Stinson Beach, and then back into the city.

Overall a great weekend. I HIGHLY recommend piling in the car and going on a road trip – with our without a destination in mind. Very nice… And my favorite pictures? These:

The rest of ’em are here:

Northern California Coast

This is a test people…

Even if you really think Grey Davis is a jack ass and should be thrown out of office do you REALLY think Arnold going to do a better job? Or is this just about being angry? ( in case you couldn’t tell I’m neither a fan of the recall NOR a fan of having the terminator as Governor )

Regardless of what you vote for – GO VOTE.. PLEASE. (or if you’re not in CA or not 18 then tell someone in CA that is 18 to vote… :):) )

( Sorry… Just couldn’t stay quiet about this today… I wanted to – I really did… but I couldn’t… )

Friday?

Oh my LORD… It REALLY doesn’t feel like friday to me for some reason… I woke up this morning feeling like I was wearing one of those lead vests that they put on you at the dentist’s office before they take X-Rays. I have SOOOOOO MUCH to do at work today and its looking like some of that is going to have to go into the weekend. There is some cool stuff going on so I’m enjoying it but its turning into a real challenge balancing some of the new stuff I’m responsible for with the old stuff that I still have to do.

Thats part of the bummer of working on software some times – I’ve worked on this product long enough to become the resident expert in my small corner of the app and features I’ve done continue to dog me past the previous releases in the form of bugs and other cleanup that still needs to be done even though it really isn’t much fun. At the same time new things are landing on my lap that are more fun and more interesting and the hard part becomes prioritizing them. I find far to easy to either let the bugs get the best of me and wind up with no time for the fun feature work I WANT to be doing – OR ignore the bugs because they’re not as much fun to work on and spec out the features only to discover you’ve got a huge heap of bugs that need love… I woke up this morning feeling like I’m in the latter situation and its bummin me out…

Guess I just gotta suck it up and take it like a man.. Off to work.. Wish me luck!

Weekend Wrap up

LORD… I’m EXHAUSTED… LONG Damn weekend.. Lot of fun though… So here’s a quick wrap up:

• Friday night – Saw Party Monster with Brian and Kevin. Brian and Kevin liked it. Little much for me but better than sitting at home with re-runs of Three’s Company. Gotta say that Seth Green was pretty damn good. And ya gotta love Marilyn Manson and Amanda Lepore – they’re just wrong… I love it. And the messed up drag was pretty damn cool
  
• Saturday – Spent the morning helping my mom distribute flyers for her author’s club event to comic book stores around the city(Neil Gaiman is speaking at San Jose State University). After that Kevin and i went to a surprise party for some friends of his that just signed their domestic partnership papers.. was a lot of fun
  
• Sunday – Folsom Street Fair… Was a LOT of fun though its been years since anything at that fair has shocked me. Think the three things that stuck in my head are the guy lighting his cigarette with a magnifying glass, the woman with snakes on her head, and the Leather Horse Man/Woman (had leather harnasses on, horse hooves, a tail, and a big long maine… looked cool though miserable to wear)… Here are the pix (most of ’em are kevin’s handy work).

  Folsom Street Fair 2003

  Of course there was also the usual collection of hot men in leather and I do love that! 😉

Shoot me now

Today has proven two very important things about my personality:

• I work very well under pressure and a deadline.
• I’m pretty damn unpleasant to be around while I”m in that mode! (ask kevin what I was like last night if you doubt that! 😉

Details to follow!

Not so impressed

So i tried out the Day and Night contacts that Ray recommended… Not as impressed with them as he was… For the first few days my eyes had a great deal of trouble switching focus – when I left the computer to go out side i couldn’t focus for a while. The lenses seemed to take about 15 minutes or so to settle in in the morning during which time my eyes were pretty uncomfortable.. Since the whole point of paying the extra to be able to wake up and see in the morning and I really couldn’t I decided to pass.. Back to my AcuVue…