I have been noting good blog post ideas to myself lately without making the time to make any of them happen, so this will be a catch up post, filled with a string of events, thoughts, funny sightings – whatever pops into my mind reflecting on the recent weeks this Saturday morning.
Mom and I took a vacation a few weeks ago to San Francisco. It was a great time. Mom loves the city and I love to research and plan things to do. We had such a full long weekend. We went to Half Moon Bay, saw a Shakespeare in the park, saw Chihuly’s amazing work at the De Young, winded down Lombard Street in my car, waited our turn to go up Coit Tower, ferried it out to Angel Island to never go on the tour, saw a show – The Drowsy Chaperone at a beautiful SF theatre, saw a movie, went to the wharf and the beach, shopped, found the coolest neighborhood garden in Palo Alto, and went to a Giants Game!
I posted many of our pictures here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elliottgoodwin/sets/72157606583191855/, unfortunately in a rush to get them off my camera I think I accidentally deleted like half of them from the end of our trip. That has really been bothering me because they are lost forever… I keep thinking they will some how mysteriously show up – just as they did disappear… that is the downside of being a paranoid to do list manager as I am, sometimes you rush to get things done and things go wrong. Deleting those pictures really makes me mad.
The other big recent event is I completed my first triathlon! Deb and I did a triathlon near Lompoc where she lives. It was such a great time and such an important personal milestone for me. I set the goal of completing a triathlon either 1 or 2 years ago as a chance to set a goal that would make me learn how to swim. I never learned to swim as a kid and am borderline afraid of the water. So I did it, and it was so great to do it with a friend! I will admit that the swim was in a pool so our next tri will be in open water, maybe in LV, we shall see we are still plotting.
Driving back from Lompoc I saw two older men at the pump next to mine at a gas station. One of the nice men was cleaning his windshield as the other kept him company. Then he started cleaning his entire car with the windshield wiper, he was so proud of his efficient use of resources. His friend looked so embarrassed I think he would have climbed into the trunk if he could have. I thought this was funny, i wondered how he answered the sometimes typical prompt after filling up his gas tank, Carwash? Yes/No.
On my drive to and from Lompoc I also listened to 2 audio books. On the way there I listened to Farewell my Subaru, as the proud driver of a fine all wheel drive Subaru that no longer makes as much sense where I live this title caught my eye. It is about changing your life and reducing your impact to the environment. He did that by moving to New Mexico, starting a ranch with goats and chickens, and parking his Subaru for a truck converted to run on biodiesel. I liked it. It could have been read a bit better. The content was very enjoyable. Don’t worry, I didn’t notice the humor in me driving 4+ hours to swim, bike and run while listening to a book about reducing your fuel footprint…
I drove back Saturday so that I could have Sunday to Burning Man shop. Elliott and I have been on mad spending spree to prepare for our week + vacation to the playa. This has included thrift stores for costumes, hardware stores for our shade structure, army surplus stores for costumes and shade, Target for misc supplies, you get the idea. Well I spent all day running around to check as many things as I could off the check list, Elliott had a picnic with a group he is involved in so he was off the hook. I did so good. At the end of the day though I realized my Kulesza worry wrinkles were worse than ever. These are those wrinkles on your phase between your eyebrows that develop from worrying particularly if your worrying is attached to your face, which seems to be a genetic disposition of mine. I don’t think I ever noticed until a recent trip to Las Vegas when Kathi was pointing out everyone’s worry wrinkles. I think she was thinking about shooting botox or who knows what else into hers. Anyway mine are normally just vertical, although after a long day with customer service people that will never be as good as I was at Champs back in high school my visible dismay had turned horizontal showing 2 L’s on my forehead. Elliott tried to rub them out for me. I am not sure but I think I listened to a meditation on the ipod before going to bed which calmed me.
Work has been great, we are busy, with a new project that is pursuing LEED certification so we are enjoying some sustainable design as well as our efforts for sustainable living. Today we will trek back to the farmers market for our favorite dates and whatever else shows up. And we have a weekend full of BM prep, a party with some new friends that will be our playa mates, and probably some work intertwined in there too. All with the vision of in a week and a few days I will be cruising on my fatty seat on my playa bike, in lord knows what kind of outfit, checked out from reality. My blackberry will not work. I will not be able to respond to little work things here and there as I usually do. I plan to check out the art. Write. Take pictures. Meditate. Meet some new people. Reflect. And spend some awesome time with my love and friends new and old.
