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So I've been in the states since Thanksgiving. After Turducken Tuesday and Disneyland, Vince and I headed to Vegas for a few days. We played some poker, saw Blue Man Group and hung out with Jaymebond.
Vinztento aggro tarding live fish:
Jaymes' spot in Veer and on the roof with jacuuzi
Vegas was pretty fun. We packed out bags and headed straight for the Bay Area. We saw some guys cartsailing and thought it was picture worthy. Expert timing by Vinny here:
I got my iphone 4s as I mentioned in the last blog. I got the wifi-hotspot feature with it and I am extremely happy with the speed. I'm getting like 3 mbps down and 1 mbps up with 3g which is more than enough to grind on. Here is Vince passing time grinding on the way to the bay:
Day one: Watched the 49ers crush.
I thought this sign in the stadium was funny. You may have to enlarge it to see it. I
If you can't see it, it says: TO REPORT UNRULY FANS, TEXT "BADFAN" (SPACE) ISSUE AND LOCATION TO 69050
We did the North Bay and SF on the first day. Still convinced there is no better place on Earth. I can't think of a single weakness this place has except for cost of living. Of course this is completely subjective but for me, it's the best.
Dinner at OSHA Thai. Easily the best soup of all time. Coconut curry with shrimp and mushrooms:
Bacon wrapped scallops and Singha Beer:
My former residence - Sausalito:
Shores of Tiburon (holla Rob). GG in background (Golden Gate)
Standard SF streets
The next day I went to my Grandpa's retirement ceremony. He was on the city council of San Mateo, CA and was the mayor 3 times. Was a very cool ceremony and you can tell he was a true boss by all the people that had farewell messages and gifts for him.
I thought his cake was cool:
We then hit the southbay for a day. We went hiking in the hills. As Viciente pointed out, it's really amazing to have a huge, urban city scape of like 4 million people starting less than 1 mile from this:
There is very large city living and experiences to be had in the Bay Area, but a lot of the charm is in the small surrounding cities as well. Here is Saratoga:
I went to visit my mom as she had surgery. It all went well and I decided to bring her donuts as a gift. We went to this spot called Psycho Donut in San Jose. They had a pretty eclectic range of donuts. Each one has a description of a mental patient with the symptoms being the ingredients.
PB & J and Bacon:
Oreo
Cereal Killer
We liked SF so much we went back and just walked the streets. I took Vinsteezy to this spot called "top of the mark". Ultra cool spot with a classic feel and amazing view:
More night views of the City:
One of my favorite things to do is to order beer samplers at breweries. This one was decent at the Marin Brewing Company.
The Neighborhood Restaurant in San Diego has one of the best one's I've ever had as well.
Some small but useful travel tips I've come to appreciate are:
1) Always carry an extension chord/power strip. You and your friends will have to charge laptops, phones, GPS devices etc and you may only have 1 accessible spot for electricity.
2) Charging your phone at night is a must
3) Hotwire sucks for booking if you need 2 beds.
4) Become a VIP member of Travel sites such as Hotwire, Orbitz, etc. It's free and the benefits can be awesome. For instance, I've had to change my hotel plans twice and Hotwire will NOT issue a refund unless you booked it as an "Express" (VIP) member.
5) Take pictures of everything. Don't be lazy about it.
Make sure everyone coming has their own money. I said this in a blog before. I've had to be the guy loaning money out because monies were tied up in currencies or online financial institutions. I'm 100% positive I'm at least 300-500 short because of this. Not that I was taken advantage of or anything like that, but simply because I forgot to collect. Since I got my iphone, I've asked Siri to remind me of several times that I loaned monies out. Today I got one saying someone owed me $120 and I have no idea what it was for or when I loaned it out. So the problem is that every time I loan out, I am freerolling the person that I will forget. On top of all the other stuff I am doing, it is very likely that I have forgotten about a decent amount of loans out.
I am just going to have a strict no loaning policy from now on and conversely will have to make sure that I have my own funds available at all times. Hate to sound like such a nit, but times is hard on the streets.
I got a free 7 day membership at one of the sickest gyms I've ever been too. I'll be making use of that for sure. Also gonna visit some more friends and spend the next two weeks trying new restaurants and seeking out new life and new civilizations.
To boldly go where I've been plenty of times before.