San Fran Cliff'sNotes

Hokay, only one pic for now. It took me all of 10 minutes of mousewrangling to wrestle this dagum photo onto the internets.

• In Blue Tortoise hostel right now. Seems super-freakin-cool. Lots of young-uns, plenty of people from other countries, just talked to an Irish woman and forgot her name (way to go, jerk). It sounded cool while I remembered it.
• Met up with Parker's British buds after riding over the bridge. Went up shadiest elevator ever and dropped our junk in their hotel room, and hit the nearest bar. Some totally random guy bought us all drinks and immediately went away and chatted with some other folk. Bouncer did not like my hobo-ID. Smuggled some Ben and Jerry's in. Parker got some girl's phone # without even trying. I ended the night by passing out sitting on a stool, with the Brits faces appearing occasionally when I was able to pull myself from the darkness. It was 12:30. We'd been up since 4:30 AM, I'd gotten about 4 hours of terrible, mosquito-tormented, hotnasty sleep behind a gas station, and we'd ridden 110-ish miles. Hello SanFran.
• I found some Jeans and a hoodie that previously belonged to a fellow named Danny at a massive Goodwill. Bought a knock-off messenger bag for $9 from some Chineese vendor on the street. Had to go back and exchange for a second one after I found out the buckle would release after putting it on. Spent the day unsuccessfully trying to box and send my extra junk home. Had fun riding and getting lost in SF. Relatively respectful, safe drivers, no red-light delay, bumpy streets, bikers EVERYWHERE, hipsters on fixies, racers in lycra, regular peoples on MTBs, hybrids, and old 10-speeds. Just as many girls riding as guys. It takes a surprisingly long time to get around because of the lights and all the traffic. Had some fun weaving throughout the traffic. Cops don't care if you pull some shady business right in front of them, even running a light or almost-grazing a few cars at a time.
• Couchsurfed at Zach's and Walkers for 4 nights. Tastylicious, organically healthy dinner at Zach's. Walker cooked up a sweet American breakfast. Dunno what did me in, but woke up with a really nasty feeling in my stomach that still hasn't fully subsided, and had me majorly miserable for 2 or 3 days. Garbage. Those days, the city had a nasty little edge on it. It dindn't help at all that they were cloudy and cold, never above 60 degrees during the day. Checked out the MOMA, SF Photographic, spent a painful day on Walker's couch, reading and sleeping. Walker's girlfriend found out about me trip and said she was hoping to do a similar thing with her father when he retired. I shared some wisdom. I need to write up all the little-known stuff I learnt.
• Sun came out. Stomach calmed down. Still a little tweaky, but I can deal. Soup and coffee seem to help quite a bit. Breakfast at Morning Due at Church and 17th- FREAKIN SWEET!! Super-nice Barrista's, delicious Omlettes, uber-relaxing. Cafe Trieste- nice n cozy. The Revolution cafe- anarchy, latin music, and bagels. Rode around the Embarcadero, Fisherman's warf, touristy as aw hail, Presidio (windy as aw hail), Seal rock (no seals), Golden Gate park (surprisingly dissapointing), stomach ache returned when I started climbing some massive hills. I NEED A MOPED DANGIT. $40 an hour!!!???? No thank you.
• Couchsurfed with Chad, a teacher. Did some engineering counseling with Jack. Farmer's Market on Pier Uno= very sweet. 30 person lines for the women's bathroom, though it didn't really bother me. People watching for a few hours. Free baseball in the Standing Room??? HA!! YOU STUPIT. (I stupid.)
  
• Throw in a couple parties and some enlightening SF-local interactions, an excursion to the kid-ridden Exploratorium and a Chinatown restaurant with Halley, a few hobos, one or two showers, a surprising amount of missing North Carolina, Isotope comics, sleeping on a park bench, and a lot of bike locks, and that's been my week-plus in SF in a nutshell

Must go enjoy the SUN, and surprisingly warm weather (short sleeves!!!).

Redeye flight back to NC on Tues.


Steven
08-10-08
San Francisco