San Francisco

Thats wht I did after work today, I hung out in SF. It has a really kind of cool energy. I hung out down town. Too much work lately, I had to do something completly different. Such a plethera of peoples, each living their lives with much greater variability than I usually see. Diversity is good to see, it makes one feel better inside, like I'm a part of a greater society than I usualy see it as.

I always talk to the degenerates whenever I visit a city. They are the only ones who ever talk to me anyway. People who live in the city don't seem to speak to people as much as they do in smaller places. All those people going by and nobody even acknowledges that you exist, but the guy who needs you to give him a little change often looks you straight in the eye and smiles. It makes me feel good, and I often give them change. If they have anything to say, I listen. Its good to connect with people sometimes. Its amazing how lonely crowded places can be.

Then it came time to drive back to the hotel, down in the Silicon Valley. I had gotten directions from MapQuest before I left the offices. You would think that I would have had the sense to follow them BACKWARDS to get where I was going. Nope. It never even ocurred to me. I just took off and assumed I would see a sign that said "HEY YOU! The 101 is this way->", but I didn't see it. I just kept driving and driving. At the red lights, I quested for a map and directions with my super-duper phone. Nope.

After about 20 minutes, I called my wife. She quested for a map on the desktop and was rather sucessful. "Okay" she says, "start out heading East towards Van Ness." Okay, but I had no idea which way East was, so I picked one.

"What street should come next?"

"Let me zoom in. Wait, it zoomed into the bay!"

"Here is Octavia street. Pierce street. Do you see any of those?"

"Wait. I can't pan over there. Oh,here it is."

Anyway, I ended up at the Golden Gate Bridge. I didn't go over it though. I hung up the phone and turned around at an exit marked as the last SF exit. It was a cool site, but I dont want to go across it until my wife is visits here. Maybe the next time. I called her again and she guided me all the way back. Street after street.

"Do you see Myrtle Street yet? Did you cross it? What street are you at?"

"Octavia."

"Really? You have only gone like an inch. You have 4 inches to go."