Good will towards men, etc. The holiday season has had the desired effect--I've lost track of the days and have a seemingly endless supply of chocolate and jellybeans to hand. Lovely. I felt only vaguely guilty when I went to the gym yesterday and spent 50 minutes squeezing a weird spiky ball between my thighs (it was Hello Kitty pink, folks, which made it almost palatable) and realised I would instantly undo all of my good work with the gobbling of just two chocolate coins.
We spent Christmas with my brother and family after catching a Christmas Eve performance of the Nutcracker. Love that ballet, and I don't care how ubiquitous/cheesy it may be. The music is beautiful, the costumes are beautiful, and I have been watching the SF Ballet do it since I was 5. So there.
Other Christmas season highlights:
* Admiring the giant swan in the window of Marc Jacobs on Fillmore St. Bizarre fun.
* A quick burger and bloody Mary at Harry's after picking up some fabu gifts. I love giving good gift.
* My third-ever manicure. I finally broke down and went to the little nail studio across the road that I have been spying on for the past year. I picked a pale pink polish called Bubble Bath.
* The twinkly snowflake lights on the side of the Sak's building. So pretty.
* A verrrry strong Margarita in the Carnelian Room, at the top of the Bank of America building. The view is gorgeous--the bay and city laid out for you as if you were a despot. I felt teary, jubilant, nostalgic, and slightly giddy all at once.
After bidding adieu to the family the day after Christmad we headed to Carmel, a cutesy little seaside village that has turned into a caricature of itself. Dad lived there and practiced medicine when he first moved to the US. Every shop smells like vanilla cupcakes. And it costs $9 to do the 17-Mile Drive made famous by the Pebble Beach golf course and US Open. And if that weren't enough to turn you off, the first ever Thomas Kincaid gallery opened in Carmel 15 years ago. If you're not familar with him, he's the most collected living artist today. He depicts ideal chocolate box-style cottages and village scenes and is known for his technique with light--everything looks all twinkly and elf-like. He designed a whole housing sub-division in my birth city, Vallejo. He makes me feel nauseous but I couldn't stop myself from diving into his gallery and having a giggle. If Santa had known about that, I'm pretty sure I would have been left off the sleigh route. Ah well.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Sentimentality alert
Feeling nostalgic today. And sick. I have been sick all week--nasty flu-ey congestion and fuzzy head--and nostalgic for about three weeks. We finally made a firm decision about our future--we're heading back to New Zealand next year. I resigned from my job yesterday and that's all folks. I'm glad we have a plan of sorts because I am the original girl with a plan. If I'm not heading somewhere with some objective in mind I am pretty miserable. So that's good. But I love living in San Francisco. It's a childhood dream come true and while I always knew it was temporary I guess I figured it would be a more longterm move than it's turned out to be. We have been here a year. We flew into New York on September 1, 2006 and we moved into our chilly wee apartment last December. So we've experienced all the seasons here and watched our neighbors gorgeously OTT decorations change from St Patrick's elves to Easter bunnies and eggs, to summer flowers, to Halloween ghouls, to Thanksgiving cones of plenty, to Christmas wreaths--and all of it wonderfully American in scale.
Today is cold but sunny. I had to drop Tim off for his Saturday business class and then drove home along California St, past the Bank of America building (tallest in the city, home to our money manager), past two cable cars, past the Fairmont Hotel and Tonga Bar where we have yet to go, past Grace Cathedral where we attended an ANZAC service, past Fillmore St where I do so much of my window shopping and we do our laundry, past the Jewish Community Center where I work out, and finally past our block with its Edwardian apartment buildings and fancy home shops. It is all so pretty.
* * * *
Enough bellyaching--we went to the Dickens Fair last weekend. The Cow Palace, a huge South SF venue for bullriding competitions and monster truck shows, was transformed into ye olde London. Or, I should say, the area where they keep the cattle and such for the big shows was transformed into ye olde London. The big domed Palace itself was a happy place for me as a child. My family used to go for the bullriding and equestrian shows thanks to Dad's country boy roots. My favorite part was intermission when we would eat Mom's egg salad sandwiches while the rodeo clown entertained us. He had huge overalls and tiny dogs would emerge from his pant legs to jump through hoops. I think there may have been a tiny spider monkey too, or that could be a 7-year-old's embellishment. In any case, it was cool fun.
So last Sunday we went to the animal area, where 25 years ago I admired blueblood horses, and it was packed with costumed folks and jewellery stalls and food places, and more costumed folk doing skits and singing bawdy songs. We watched the Irish and Scottish dancers for a while and ate some fried oysters and tried on some hats (a Robin Hood cap for T and a floral wreath for me) and headed home.
Today is cold but sunny. I had to drop Tim off for his Saturday business class and then drove home along California St, past the Bank of America building (tallest in the city, home to our money manager), past two cable cars, past the Fairmont Hotel and Tonga Bar where we have yet to go, past Grace Cathedral where we attended an ANZAC service, past Fillmore St where I do so much of my window shopping and we do our laundry, past the Jewish Community Center where I work out, and finally past our block with its Edwardian apartment buildings and fancy home shops. It is all so pretty.
* * * *
Enough bellyaching--we went to the Dickens Fair last weekend. The Cow Palace, a huge South SF venue for bullriding competitions and monster truck shows, was transformed into ye olde London. Or, I should say, the area where they keep the cattle and such for the big shows was transformed into ye olde London. The big domed Palace itself was a happy place for me as a child. My family used to go for the bullriding and equestrian shows thanks to Dad's country boy roots. My favorite part was intermission when we would eat Mom's egg salad sandwiches while the rodeo clown entertained us. He had huge overalls and tiny dogs would emerge from his pant legs to jump through hoops. I think there may have been a tiny spider monkey too, or that could be a 7-year-old's embellishment. In any case, it was cool fun.
So last Sunday we went to the animal area, where 25 years ago I admired blueblood horses, and it was packed with costumed folks and jewellery stalls and food places, and more costumed folk doing skits and singing bawdy songs. We watched the Irish and Scottish dancers for a while and ate some fried oysters and tried on some hats (a Robin Hood cap for T and a floral wreath for me) and headed home.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Me and the young fogey
John Denver’s nana is on television. Umm-hmm. Tim was flicking around the channels and stumbled on a 90-minute John Denver special and I said, “No!” and he said, “Rock on!” My husband is a young fogey.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
We had a moment
So I’m seriously starting to wonder if I have an executive-style ulcer cos my stomach has been misbehaving for a couple months now. It seems so 80s and unoriginal. I don’t even have a briefcase, and I don’t feel that stressed. But I have always been good at compartmentalizing and I think that’s my problem now. Nothing in our lives is feeling settled and stable and rather than meet this interesting challenge head on in an adult manner, I choose to deal with it on a sub-conscious level as I sit on the express bus and watch that one lady who applies her eye makeup as we skid down the hills towards the city—eyeliner, mascara, shadow, highlighter the works—and suffer the physical consequences of a burny tum and a bedtime that crawls ever forward. Soon I’ll be going nigh-nighs at 7.30pm.
Anyway, none of this means we’re not having a good time. We finally went to the Fillmore last week. It was tres funky—dark red walls with gold trim, chandeliers, opera boxes, and lots of pissed people in their 40s acting in the irresponsible way they hope their children won’t. There was one woman who fell on the floor and had to be helped up before the main act even bounced onto stage in their ruffled shirts and brocade jackets. It was the Waterboys, who Tim adores. I love Whole of the Moon and Fisherman’s Blues, so I was happy when they played those, and was deeply impressed with the brocade jacketed one’s fiddle playing, but I could have done without the dirty, skunky drunks.
I think that when you get to a certain age, and it varies from person to person, you simply can’t get away with public displays of drunkenness and general out-of-it-ness. Everyone around just resents you.
***
Oh-bama! Mayor Hunky was re-elected, which was no great surprise given his opponents were like cartoon characters, but he’s old hat now. I have a new crush—Senator Hunky from Illinois. We waited in line for an hour and half to see Obama at his SF rally on Wednesday. It seemed for a while that we weren’t going to get in at all because there were just two doors to the auditorium set up with metal detectors and there were over 6,000 people trying to squeeze in there. Just before 9pm everything stopped—the line halted, more police turned up, everything went quiet, and then whoop, whoop, the motorcade burst onto Polk St. We could see Obama sitting in the back of his Cherokee, waving, and then it stopped and he got out and I had my first-ever moment of celebrity worship. He conducted his own energy. As if he’d just jumped out of God’s pocket. It was extremely exciting. He’d been told we were the tail-end folks who might be foiled by the metal detectors and made an impromptu speech about closing Guantanamo and ending the war and other stuff that didn’t sink in because I was jumping up and down and trying to keep my eyes on him at all moments. He was just 10 feet away from us, and some of his energy clearly leapt across the crowd and into the tops of our heads because after he got back in his SUV and the secret service guys folded themselves back into shape (they did not seem happy about the unexpected pit stop) we joined the crowd who surged for the doors. The line unraveled like yarn—that someone had thrown acid on—and although some people tried to stay in formation, it was futile. We ended up getting ushered in a side door with no metal detector and no-one to check our tickets. We could have been very dangerous, I suppose, but like everyone else there that night we felt like Barack-stars.
Anyway, none of this means we’re not having a good time. We finally went to the Fillmore last week. It was tres funky—dark red walls with gold trim, chandeliers, opera boxes, and lots of pissed people in their 40s acting in the irresponsible way they hope their children won’t. There was one woman who fell on the floor and had to be helped up before the main act even bounced onto stage in their ruffled shirts and brocade jackets. It was the Waterboys, who Tim adores. I love Whole of the Moon and Fisherman’s Blues, so I was happy when they played those, and was deeply impressed with the brocade jacketed one’s fiddle playing, but I could have done without the dirty, skunky drunks.
I think that when you get to a certain age, and it varies from person to person, you simply can’t get away with public displays of drunkenness and general out-of-it-ness. Everyone around just resents you.
***
Oh-bama! Mayor Hunky was re-elected, which was no great surprise given his opponents were like cartoon characters, but he’s old hat now. I have a new crush—Senator Hunky from Illinois. We waited in line for an hour and half to see Obama at his SF rally on Wednesday. It seemed for a while that we weren’t going to get in at all because there were just two doors to the auditorium set up with metal detectors and there were over 6,000 people trying to squeeze in there. Just before 9pm everything stopped—the line halted, more police turned up, everything went quiet, and then whoop, whoop, the motorcade burst onto Polk St. We could see Obama sitting in the back of his Cherokee, waving, and then it stopped and he got out and I had my first-ever moment of celebrity worship. He conducted his own energy. As if he’d just jumped out of God’s pocket. It was extremely exciting. He’d been told we were the tail-end folks who might be foiled by the metal detectors and made an impromptu speech about closing Guantanamo and ending the war and other stuff that didn’t sink in because I was jumping up and down and trying to keep my eyes on him at all moments. He was just 10 feet away from us, and some of his energy clearly leapt across the crowd and into the tops of our heads because after he got back in his SUV and the secret service guys folded themselves back into shape (they did not seem happy about the unexpected pit stop) we joined the crowd who surged for the doors. The line unraveled like yarn—that someone had thrown acid on—and although some people tried to stay in formation, it was futile. We ended up getting ushered in a side door with no metal detector and no-one to check our tickets. We could have been very dangerous, I suppose, but like everyone else there that night we felt like Barack-stars.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Another one checked off
When I was 7 my life ambitions were as follows:
* Become super-duper speller.
* Adopt a shelter puppy.
* Aquire a Barbie townhouse.
* Coax my mother into the baking habit.
* Convince someone to build me a tree house.
* Pass beneath the Golden Gate Bridge.
* Learn to ride a bike already.
* Live in one place always like the Brady Bunch.
* I also, as I have mentioned before, wanted to become a singing secretary named either Linda or Stephanie, or perhaps both.
Few of these things have come to pass. I did eventually learn to ride my brother’s yellow banana-seated Schwinn (I will never forget looking behind me to see that Dad had let go and I was on my own. I immediately toppled over and felt such a sense of betrayal). I did acquire a shelter puppy, which didn’t turn out too well. I created a grand imaginary treehouse with many rooms including a reading niche and gourmet kitchen.
And then, guess what folks?
Yar! We went sailing on Saturday and it was lovely. We cruised beneath both spans of the Bay Bridge, down to SoMa and the AT and T ballpark, along the downtown waterfront past the ferry building and Coit Tower, skimming past Fisherman’s Wharf and Alcatraz. And I got to pass underneath the Golden Gate.
* Become super-duper speller.
* Adopt a shelter puppy.
* Aquire a Barbie townhouse.
* Coax my mother into the baking habit.
* Convince someone to build me a tree house.
* Pass beneath the Golden Gate Bridge.
* Learn to ride a bike already.
* Live in one place always like the Brady Bunch.
* I also, as I have mentioned before, wanted to become a singing secretary named either Linda or Stephanie, or perhaps both.
Few of these things have come to pass. I did eventually learn to ride my brother’s yellow banana-seated Schwinn (I will never forget looking behind me to see that Dad had let go and I was on my own. I immediately toppled over and felt such a sense of betrayal). I did acquire a shelter puppy, which didn’t turn out too well. I created a grand imaginary treehouse with many rooms including a reading niche and gourmet kitchen.
And then, guess what folks?
Yar! We went sailing on Saturday and it was lovely. We cruised beneath both spans of the Bay Bridge, down to SoMa and the AT and T ballpark, along the downtown waterfront past the ferry building and Coit Tower, skimming past Fisherman’s Wharf and Alcatraz. And I got to pass underneath the Golden Gate.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Not a morning person
Overheard on the bus:
Perky blonde commuter with bright pink lippy: “Do you mind if I open the window?”
Greying, balding commuter in grey suit: “No.”
“No, you don’t mind, or you do mind?”
“I do mind. I am cold all day at work.”
“Oh. Well, have a good day.” Muttered under breath: “Grump.”
“Yes. Sometimes I am.”
Perky blonde commuter with bright pink lippy: “Do you mind if I open the window?”
Greying, balding commuter in grey suit: “No.”
“No, you don’t mind, or you do mind?”
“I do mind. I am cold all day at work.”
“Oh. Well, have a good day.” Muttered under breath: “Grump.”
“Yes. Sometimes I am.”
Monday, October 8, 2007
Joy Luck Crap
Finally. Fortune cookies for a chica like me. Read in the NYT today about a fortune cookie company in Queens that asked its writers to come up with some more contemporary fortunes. The results include:
“Your problem just got bigger. Think, what have you done?”
“Perhaps you’ve been focusing too much on yourself.”
“It’s over your head right now. Time to get some professional help.”
Love, love, love. Next time I get a fortune cookie I am going to be extremely disappointed if I get a crap fortune like “Don’t worry, be happy” or “Today is an auspicious day.”
“Your problem just got bigger. Think, what have you done?”
“Perhaps you’ve been focusing too much on yourself.”
“It’s over your head right now. Time to get some professional help.”
Love, love, love. Next time I get a fortune cookie I am going to be extremely disappointed if I get a crap fortune like “Don’t worry, be happy” or “Today is an auspicious day.”
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