I love San Francisco! happy post vacation babble

[tigereye]

I want to move there! Great weather, friendly people, water, water and more water, astounding views everywhere, the art, progressive attitudes, great restaurants, the flora, the fauna, the history! The ferries, the boats, the sailing! And A wonderfully skilled trad. sax player we heard from 6:30 am until we checked out of our hotel.

And I fulfulled my lifelong ambition to see City Lights and the largest poetry selection in the world! (I'm not that hard to please, you see.) :)

I envy all you folks who live there. Except when I consider how little my house cost here. But then, you get to see SF everyday.

[swag]

1. Welcome back.

I'm glad it was such a smashing time for you.

[tigereye]

4. if I can figure out how

I'll send you a Vesuvio pic! It looked really cool, but alas you can't take a kid in there. So I just wandered around in there for a while. I should have done a quick shot while I was in there just to say I did. Maybe when h and I go alone the next time. ;)

[swag]

6. I'll PM you my email address when the time comes.

[Talismom]

2. So do I! Went there on the way home from Hawaii at the end of

our honeymoon. SF was the best part of the honeymoon! Great food, great concerts, great politics just loved it! I hear it's pricey, but I'm from NYC so what the heck!

[tigereye]

7. the plane we took fro Chicago to SF

was continuing on to Honolulu, so we were briefly tempted! ;) SF is a great city. Food cost wasn't too bad, and there are inexpensive boutique hotels that were quite reasonable. Also we stayed with old friends who live there, so that helped.

[faithnotgreed]

3. i may be visiting berkeley

this fall as part of "where am i moving to" tour
either canada or berkeley area

good to hear about sf
i know it would be a fantastic place to live

glad you enjoyed yourself so much
it does sound wonderful

[tigereye]

21. didn't get to Berkeley alas

it will have to wait for next time.

[faithnotgreed]

32. just another good reason for a trip right

[tigereye]

37. well, I just looked at the line-up for SF's fall jazz festival ....

woah. :) :bounce:

http://www.sfjazz.org/

[faithnotgreed]

43. dont get me started

im trying to focus

(clicking tempting link)

[tigereye]

44. well

beware the link of jazz delight! ;)

[Yavin4]

5. I Visited SF Once On Vacation

Wound up living there for four years. Got me through Bush I.

[tigereye]

22. if any place would be the antidote for conservatism,

SF would certainly be one. Or NYC. :)

[HEyHEY]

8. BLAH BLAH BLAH

;-)

Glad to hear you had fun. ANd that you didn't get mugged in Frisco!

[tigereye]

10. I thought of you while we were there!

I'll PM you to tell you why....;)

It was great. Wish we had had time and scratch to come up your way. Maybe next time... there are a lot of cool folk I would like to see in the NW.

[Clintmax]

9. I had a few days in San Francisco also! It was great!

Loved the trollys, the food, the sights...only BAD thing was how damned COLD it was there! I froze my behind off! I'm not used to that kind of weather!

[tigereye]

11. you know, I liked how cool it was!

We left Pittsburgh where it had been in the 90s the day before, and the cool with no humidity ( Pgh is like a sauna in the summer) was welcome. While we were in SF it would be cloudy and overcast in the am and then warm up with sun in the pm. I didn't mind switching from sweater to t-shirt and back again. Although, we met an older couple in Chinatown (natives, I think) who said that SF was way too cold. ;)

[swag]

16. It's obvious from this passage that we need a full and very

detailed trip report with photos.

[tigereye]

18. yeah I know everyone is desperate to hear every detail

(facetiousness on)

maybe we can get a website together or something...

[swag]

24. Helps us relive some parts, and note stuff that we missed that we can

get the next visit. Mostly selfish reasons for wanting details of your trip, but also wanting to hear what it was like for you, with kids, with your weather, your companions.

Trip diaries are often among the best reads.

[tigereye]

35. you know, you are a very nice man

(I promise not to tell anyone.) :) That's a nice idea. After reading some Beat goodies in City Lights, I felt inspired to write a little poetry, anyway. Or see Corso's poem about The Coit Tower. Oops, can't find the text at this moment, but here's a good one:

I Held a Shelley Manuscript

My hands did numb to beauty
as they reached into Death and tightened!

O sovereign was my touch
upon the tan-inks's fragile page!

Quickly, my eyes moved quickly,
sought for smell for dust for lace
for dry hair!

I would have taken the page
breathing in the crime!
For no evidence have I wrung from dreams--
yet what triumph is there in private credence?

Often, in some steep ancestral book,
when I find myself entangled with leopard-apples
and torched-skin mushrooms,
my cypressean skein outreaches the recorded age
and I, as though tipping a pitcher of milk,
pour secrecy upon the dying page.



and note my poor by comparison haiku in the haiku poetry slam thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=3784382&mesg_id=3790066

[swag]

39. Thanks for the poem.

Did you get up to the Coit Tower, see the murals? The cathedral?

What a beautiful city. It has been too long. Thanks for the reminder.

[tigereye]

42. yes my h took big panorama shots of the murals from the Tower

they were stellar. You could see their complexity even more when we looked at the digipix. Then we went to the SFMOMA and he saw an early Diego Rivera. He was in ecstasy. Missed the Cathedral.

The Asian Art Museum was closed Monday... we had wanted to see that.


I am always glad to send some poetry. :)

[bridgit]

12. so do we...

glad you had a nice time :hi:

[tigereye]

14. thanks!

maybe the best vacation we have ever taken! :hi:

[AussieDave]

13. San Fran is da bomb !!!

My sister lives there and she loves it. I can get over there every two or three years so I make the most of it.

New York is my other fave place - just can't get enough of it.......

[ignatius 2]

15. I am going to San Fran at the end of the month and I absolutely can't

wait. I read in a guide book that San Fran is like a fine wine to be cherished and enjoyed.

[tigereye]

20. I have wanted to go all my life -

and this was the first time that all the "planets aligned," so to speak, for it to happen. And I got to take my 9 year old there for his first plane trip.

It is just amazing. I can't describe how beautiful it is, the bay, the colors of the water and sky, the way the houses stack up the hills, the light, the fog - it has a very Italianate look and a very pleasant feel.

[newsguyatl]

17. great city, just

way too crowded... houses on top of houses on top of houses on top of houses.

with that said though, you don't have to drive too far out to get to the ocean and utter beauty.

[tigereye]

25. you know, it seemed much less crowded than New York

but then we were walking around during the day. I loved Chinatown, I loved North Beach, I loved the ferry, the atmosphere, Union Square... there wasn't that harried feel that you get in some cities. And all the languages I heard. I like hustle and bustle.

But the quiet parts of the "country" that we went to were also beautiful in their own way.

[sakabatou]

19. DId the Bushman spook ya'?

What was your favorite sites?

[gardenista]

23. Ha! Bushman has taken on a meta meaning now, hasn't he?

He got me once, even when I knew he was there.

Kinda meataphoric,eh?

[tigereye]

26. no I didn't really think about the news or * much

on edit, you mean some character?... not sure what you mean... something is flickering at the edges of my consciousness... on second edit, since we avoided Fish. wharf... walked right through it and up the hill...I guess we missed our chance. :)

However, the vibrancy of the atmosphere was distracting enough.

Top things to see for me?

view of the city/bay from the ferry we took from Alameda
Coit Tower depression era murals/view
view from the Powell-Hyde cable car
City Lights
The Golden Gate bridge/all the fog
The Muir Woods were very peaceful
The Maritime Museum/national park on the bay
watching the cable cars turn around from the hotel window
all the happy international tourists
THE ROSES and other flora and fauna

:)

[bullwinkle428]

27. We're planning on spending 4 days there as

part of our vacation this October...can't wait to go!!:bounce:

[tigereye]

30. it is the best!

best vacation we have ever had. I know you will have a great time!

:thumbsup:

[ScreamingMeemie]

28. That sounds wonderful!

Glad you had such a good time. Welcome back! :hug:

[tigereye]

31. glad to be back!

how are you Mrs. G? How is everyone? :hug: back atcha!

[barb162]

29. It's a wonderful city and so is the surrounding area; gorgeous

[Terran]

33. Can you believe I left the place 11 years ago

and moved to rural Missouri? San Francisco is a great place to visit, but like any other dense city, it has its downsides. But I do miss my old neighborhood--South of Market, near 11th and Harrison.

I lived in the East Bay for many years, Berkeley and Oakland, and while it's not as glamorous, it's a lot more livable.

[Dukkha]

34. we were once neighbors!

I left 5 years ago back to rural Ohio. My old neighborhood--South of Market, near 7th and Howard. I miss it terribly at times but life is SO much cheaper now.

I also live in East Oakland off Fruitvale.

[tigereye]

36. the friends we stayed with live in Alameda

we got off to meet them at the Fruitvale station.

I was astounded by the housing prices. This is why I live in Pittsburgh. :)

[tigereye]

38. kick so I can babble more!

[Bunny]

40. Hey, you! Glad you had a great time!

:hi:

Buying back to school stuff yet?

[tigereye]

45. no, but just had to do the big post vacation food shopping

and brave the depths of the fridge to see what I forgot to throw out before we left. :scared:

I don't usually buy school stuff til the week before or after... and he already has a lot of newer clothes from last school year's growth spurt. How bad was your tally? Besides it makes no sense to me to buy anything but shorts til it gets cooler, anyway, since we don't do the uniform thing.

I can't believe it's August! And part of me still wants to go to the beach. (shakes head)

What's up, Bunny? :hi:

[Bunny]

46. Oh, it'll be $500 before it's all over. But a lot of that is due to Young

Bunny's growth spurt, and Baby Bunny needs all new school uniforms this year! Gadzooks!

[tigereye]

47. well, given how much we just laid out for our trip,

I can empathize.

[cally]

41. confession time

I haven't been to Coit Tower in years and I live 1/2 hour away. I don't think my teens remember it at all. I'm taking them tomorrow since we already have a SF day planned. I'm glad you enjoyed your trip.

[tigereye]

48. I really liked it -

it looked very Italianate when we were on the ferry, but apparently it was designed to look like a firehose nozzle, since the heiress who paid for it was obsessed both with firemen and their firehoses. ;)

thanks! Hope you have fun.