Endeavor: If You're Going to San Francisco...

...be sure to wear a winter coat in July. But actually the weather was very nice for this time of year. Ever heard the saying, "the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco." Damn, that's true.

It was great that Yvonne could join me in the northern region of this vast state. She had never been to San Francisco and so I demanded that that tragedy end. She flew up on Wednesday and spent a few days in Concord with me at the prestigious Premiere Inns. Talk about luxury. They have coin operated laundry there! We had some good times in Concord, including a long debate about whether it's pronounced "Con-cord" or "Con-kerd." Apparently, to the locals, it's "Con-kerd" which I had difficulty saying because it sounds like, well, you know.

After my week at work, we headed into the city via BART. Well, actually, a 45 minute car ride to the Oakland Airport car rental return, a 10 minute shuttle to the airport terminal, a 20 minute shuttle to the BART station, and then a 25 minute ride on the BART. But our hotel was literally right to us as we left the BART station downtown.

Speaking of hotel! Hot damn! We got a very nice deal (thank you Starwood employee discount). We stayed at the Palace, one of San Francisco's oldest hotels. It was beautiful.

Lovely spa/pool area

Very nice king size bed

Right away we had to go out and explore. We headed for Chinatown since it was a short walk from where we were staying.

But of course we need Starbucks first

The gate

The Floating Sushi Boat Restaurant!

A Coca-Cola sign Yvonne just had to have a picture of

This building was really amazing. The picture came out nicely but it doesn't really capture the building's colors and architecture

We weren't quite sure what this building was and I still don't think I know

We were looking for Vesuvio's and the Beat Museum and came to this intersection. We spent about 10 minutes on the corner trying to figure out where we were. We finally found the Beat Museum and spent a few minutes there. We asked the curator where Vesuvio's was and he pointed right next to where we had been standing! We are direction wizards!

There's Vesuvio's! It was a great bar...it was obvious it had a lot of history. Jack Kerouac used to drink and write there.

This drink was the "Jack Kerouac." It was a mixture of each kind of liquor mixed in with draino and varnish. At least that's what it tasted like. I don't think he really drank those.

We, of course, had to check out the famous City Lights bookstore. They had some great independent magazines.

Aerial shot!

On our walk back to the hotel, Yvonne snapped some pictures of window displays. It was funny when she said "look, it's her-meez"

The shoes I loved

Not quite sure why she took this one

In our shopping adventures we ended up at Virgin Records in the "Citizen Cupcake" coffee/bar area. We had some cokes and some citizen brew water and headed back to the hotel to figure out the next game plan

After much debate (as can be seen from Yvonne's expression), we decided to take a cab to a bar in the Mission. We were hoping it would be our scene. Weeeeeell, it wasn't really because we're not 20 year old hipsters. Not anymore, anyway. But the drinks were cheap and strong.

And I had two at once. Mmmm, pinneaple juice and rum and coke!! Swell.

Warning: the following few pictures are the product of too many pinneaple juice, rum and cokes, being snubbed by 20 year old hipsters, and not caring about repeatedly pushing the camera's flash in a "its-dark-for-a-freaking-reason" bar.

This sign sums up this particular venue.

Saturday morning we got up late and met up with Margaret (who was awesome enough to pick us up from the hotel!). We hadn't seen that girl in years! It was fun seeing her again. We headed for Haight Ashbury and ate some breakfast at "All You Knead." Mmmmm.

Aw the purty rainbow!

Remember Razzles??! They're both a candy and a gum! Wait, that's a movie line.

While we were cruising along in Haight Ashbury, Margaret got a parking ticket for not cramping her wheels to the curb! She was just going to pay the ticket, but my lawyering kicked in and I wrote an appeal letter for her...all inclusive with therewith's, thereon's, notwithstanding's, and res judicata (not really). We'll see if they're impressed.

Then we headed for a beach where you could see the Golden Gate bridge.

This girl was cute picking eucalyptus leaves in her red cowboy boots.

And Yvonne and Margaret climbing the trees.

It was cold but beautiful.

Then we drove through the Castro.

Yvonne only wanted this picture because the store is called "Pride Cleaners" and it's behind the street called "Sanchez." Ha ha. Yeah, I didn't really get it either.

Our whole plan for Saturday afternoon was to attend a monthly dance party, "Mango", at a bar called El Rio. It's $7 to get in and there is barbeque and a lot of women. It was great at first when there wasn't too much of a crowd. But then there was a crowd.

This must have been when the crowd arrived.

Being a silly cross-eyed...and a little tipsy.

She may have inhaled it but she didn't smoke it!

We sobered up a bit and had some fantastic sushi at a place in Bernal (maternal) Heights. Then Margaret took us to Wild Side West. It had a great outside courtyard with little private niches. If I hadn't been so tired by that point, I may have enjoyed it a bit more.