Behind on blogging...

My standards are slipping. It’s already Thursday and there’s been no blog until now! Perhaps because I’ve had a lot going on, without it being wildly exciting. I don’t know – let’s see.

Well, last weekend I accepted a colleague, Martin’s invitation to go to Cobb’s Comedy Club. It’s in the block just in front of our flat, so we’ve been meaning to go for a while. We went out for a burger at a cool diner in North Beach, then to an Irish pub (at least we were with real Irish people – Martin and his wife!), then it was off to the Comedy Club. The featured performer was John Oliver, who’s actually a Brit on an American programme called The Daily Show. It was – thankfully – very funny, then it was a very short walk home after that!

Started quite late on Saturday, then went for a jog and did some chores. In the afternoon I had a baby shower to go to at another colleague, Elizabeth’s place. She only lives a few blocks away, so I walked, but it involved scaling one of San Francisco’s famous gradients. Still, it wasn’t raining (for once! We’ve had lots of bad weather recently), so I enjoyed the stroll past all the lovely Edwardian buildings and the streets leading off to bay views. The baby shower itself was fun – played some games, ate lots of food, drank lemonade and listened to all the baby advice being given.

On Sunday, we were supposed to be going on a whale-watching trip, but it was cancelled due to the storm forecast. In the end, the weather wasn’t that bad. We took the opportunity to do some shopping and bought ourselves some ski boots from REI. A good time to go, because they have sales on now. We also tried out a new café for lunch, topped off by coffee and a cake from Mara’s Italian Pastry shop.

On Monday night I had a date with my friends from Italian class. One of the party – Yana – had a baby in November and invited us around to her place in the Richmond district to speak Italian and see the (very cute and very small) baby.

There was no rest for the wicked, as on Tuesday night I had my Spanish class to go to. This was my third one. The first two were awful, but then I moved up to a more advanced class, which is a lot better, even though the teacher is the same.

This weekend we’re off to Yosemite to try snowshoeing. I hope the journey’s going to be OK. One of our friends skidded off the road on his way back from Tahoe last weekend and wrote his car off – in spite of it being a 4x4. Fortunately, they were both OK. We’re renting a four-wheel drive to avoid (hopefully) having to fit snow chains.

Adventures in Tahoe

This last weekend, we went up to Lake Tahoe again with a group of friends. I hadn’t realised that it was Martin Luther King weekend, i.e. schools and some lucky people (not us!) had a bank holiday today. That meant that it was an extremely busy weekend for going skiing. This became apparent 30 minutes or so into our 200 mile journey, when we hit seriously bad traffic.

We finally arrived at South Lake Tahoe at around 12:30 am. Our friend, Dave, had reserved the rooms over a website called Travelocity. Because it was a holiday weekend, he’d had trouble finding a place for us all, and ended up booking at a hip-hop themed motel, which had very loud “music” (good grief, I sound old!) blasting out while the exceedingly young staff sloped around in oversized baseball caps. Dave had received a confirmation and they’d charged him for the rooms, but the motel people informed us that they’d never confirmed the booking themselves and couldn’t honour it because they had no space (other than a very expensive room which only slept two people – but hey, it did have a bar and DJ decks, as Mr Hip-hop informed us). We decided to take our chances, and headed off into the (very cold) night to find another motel. Everywhere looked closed, but a nice Croatian chap responded to our buzzing of the night bell at the first place we tried, and luckily they did have room for us, albeit only for the one night.

The alarm went off next morning rather too early and we all headed off skiing. Jon and I had to rent our equipment first. This turned out to be a major hassle because of the sheer number of people, and it took nearly two hours of queuing to get the stuff, leaving us vowing to invest in our own. The lifts were busy, but we had a good ski once we finally got up the mountain: it was beautifully sunny and the views were as spectacular as ever. We also found a couple of quiet runs on the Nevada side, which we enjoyed very much.

That evening we went out for dinner – which fortunately was at walking distance from our new motel. I only had one glass of wine, fearing that a mixture of alcohol and altitude had been the cause of my upset stomach on the previous visit. We headed back quite early, ready to take on the next day’s skiing.

On Sunday the winds were pretty high, which meant that the Sky Express lift (which goes up to an altitude of over 10,000 feet) was closed. This in turn meant that almost the whole of the Nevada ski area was inaccessible (you have to ski down to it from Sky). As a result, the lifts on the California side were absurdly crowded. It was a case of standing in line for some twenty minutes or more to get on a lift and ski down in around five minutes, then repeat the whole thing again. However, we persevered and still managed to get some good runs in before partaking in a nice lunch at a restaurant looking straight down at the lake. While we were having lunch, a storm drifted in and it began to snow. At least that meant that the lifts were quieter afterwards, but unfortunately it also led to very poor visibility. We decided to call it a day just before 4 o’clock and skied down to the bottom.

The snow was now falling in thick flakes. It took an age to get out of the car-park and down the road. When we reached a corner, we realised the cause of the delay: a pile-up of three cars that had skidded into each other at the side of the road. We were in Dave’s car, an all-wheel-drive Audi. He took the corner confidently, but hit sheet ice, so we too skidded into the pile-up. Just as we were half-out of the car assessing the damage, there was another clunk as someone slid into the back of us. About an hour later, after observing plenty more carnage (a stand-off between a snow plough and an ambulance, a stuck vehicle being towed and several people falling dramatically on the ice), a sixth car joined the back of the pile-up. Fortunately, no one was hurt, and the damage to Dave’s car was just to the bumpers. The hilarious thing was that all the while I’d been expecting us to have to be towed, when some 90 minutes or so after the accident happened, the car in front just drove off and we were all able to follow, which begs the question as to why on earth he didn’t do that earlier!

It was very slow drive back from Tahoe, as snow chain inspections were in force. Dave’s car was OK, but we saw several people struggling to put chains on their two-wheel drives at the side of the road. In the end, it took some seven hours to get back.

However, in spite of all the drama, I actually had a great time. I got in some good skiing and there was some great camaraderie. I’m paying the price now, though – exhausted!

New York

Apologies for my blogging absence – I’ve been really busy over the last couple of weeks. Here’s what I’ve been up to…

On January 11, I set off for New York. It was actually a company outing – a kind of training weekend/ morale boost/ celebration of the company’s 15th anniversary. My company is pretty small, but it’s owned by a big corporation called Transperfect, which has 750 employees and 50 offices worldwide, so people had been shipped in from all over the globe. The trip was only planned for a couple of days, but I extended it for another two and even took Jon along, as we simply couldn’t pass up this opportunity to see the Big Apple.

The flight took just under six hours, and we arrived at JFK Airport late afternoon on the Friday. That evening we had a night out at BB King’s, a bar/music venue, where (bizarrely) an ‘80’s band from back home in San Francisco were playing! The music was cool and we danced the night away – though not as late as some people – and walked back to the hotel via the bright lights of Times Square.

The hotel itself was great. We stayed at the Grand Hyatt by Grand Central Station on East 42nd Street. We had a lovely room – all paid for by the company, of course! The hotel offered just the right amount of luxury without being pretentious. It also had a great gym which we took advantage of one morning to combat all the over-eating!

Jon went out and amused himself on Saturday, taking in Central Park, the Natural History Museum and the apartment building where John Lennon was shot! I had training and seminars in the hotel all day, which were distinguished by the morning’s keynote speech, given by none other than General Colin Powell! Think what you like about the guy and his policies, he was an amazing speaker. I sat there listening in awe and believed every word as he told us that America is still a great country. However, my colleague Barbara managed to have a chat with one of the organisers after the latter had partaken of a few wines and found how much the General cost – some $125,000!

In the evening we had our company dinner at a venue on one of the piers. The food was good, but the speeches tedious and everything you can imagine cheesy American corporate might be. We had to clear out of the event space pretty early, so I got on the so-called “party bus”, which was headed for a club. The club turned out to be ridiculously crowded, so we all headed off to Greenwich Village and a very English-style tavern. After that, I had much fun hailing a cab New York style (with a fair amount of cursing when someone pushed in front and took “our” cab), and it was back to the hotel. To bed, I thought. But no, someone had the great idea of heading out to a sake bar, which turned out to be closed, so we ended up in an Irish pub and I got busy persuading a random political agnostic to vote Democrat, then before you knew it, it was 4 a.m. Finally got to bed, but less than four hours later it was up again for breakfast (thank God for bacon) and another morning of seminars. Lunchtime couldn’t come soon enough, as that was when we were finally free. My poor colleagues had to head back that afternoon, but Jon and I went off to visit the Statue of Liberty.

The security checks you had to go through before getting on the ferry were a tad ridiculous – more stringent than when you board a plane. However, it was a nice day, if rather chilly, and we had a good, bracing walk around Liberty Island, which was essential to help wake me up! After that, we strolled to Ground Zero, but there was very little to see, other than bulldozers manoeuvring around the foundations of what had once been the World Trade Center. That evening, we went to see the musical, Chicago, on Broadway. It had a minimalist set, but great dancing, and was a lot of fun. Also, the people sitting behind us in the audience sounded just like something out of The Sopranos!

On Monday, we hit Fifth Avenue and the shops, passing by the Rockefeller Center on the way. Saw Tiffany’s of Breakfast at … fame. Some of the stores, like Barney’s, were absurdly opulent. I glanced at the label of an Armani dress and found that it was priced at some $12,000! We then took a stroll around Central Park before heading for the Empire State Building and experiencing the sensation of popping ears as the elevator zoomed us up the eighty-odd storeys to the top. In spite of the fact that it was a rather dreary day, the views were still splendid and helped to impress upon us just what an immense city New York is.

That evening, knowing we had the choice of sampling almost any cuisine, we decided to go out for an Indian, as we both craved a curry and are unable to find a decent one in San Francisco. The guidebook informed us that celebrity Indian chef, Madhur Jaffrey, had a place on the Upper East side. Fearing they might be booked up, we called in advance, but we needn’t have worried. No one here seems to have heard of Madhur Jaffrey here, so we were able to enjoy top cuisine at a reasonable price without having to reserve weeks in advance.

On our last day we visited the United Nations Headquarters and did a tour of the major assembly rooms. It was very informative and well worth doing. Then it was off to the airport for a late flight back to San Francisco and a very busy rest of the week. You can see my New York photos here: http://public.fotki.com/EllenHardwick/new-york/ (password: moocow).

Happy New Year!

Saw the New Year in at a party nearby in North Beach. We went up on the roof to watch the fireworks at midnight, which were spectacular over the skyscrapers of the Financial District. Ended up staying out until 3 a.m. – what were we doing?!

In spite of the late night, I was determined to enjoy New Year’s Day, which was lovely and sunny. Found a hike in my book, bundled Jon in the car and got him to drive me down to Pacifica, a popular surfing spot about 15 miles down the coast. Did a really good hike from there up Mount Montara. It was about 7 miles in total, leading up a valley, on to the summit and down through a pretty eucalyptus forest. Although it was a little hazy, we did enjoy views in every direction. It was easy to pick out the protruding land mass of Point Reyes, the red towers of the Golden Gate peeking up above the city, the pinnacle of Mount Diablo, some 60 miles to the east, floating above the cloud, and the blue expanse of the Pacific to the west.

We had high hopes of going skiing at the weekend, but a big storm was forecast, which scared us off, as road conditions promised to be dreadful. Friday was indeed a very stormy day. Many trees in the city had lost their branches and debris was strewn everywhere. Saturday was also blustery and wet in the morning, but after that things calmed down somewhat. We went to the cinema (Landmark at the Embarcadero, about 25 minutes’ walk away) on Saturday afternoon and saw an excellent Spanish film called The Orphanage, about … well, an orphanage, that is haunted by the ghosts of former residents.

On Sunday we managed to do our jog to the beach at Crissy Fields, which I found really tough, as I hadn’t done it for a long time. I devoted much of the afternoon to planning future weekends. We pretty much have them all mapped out until the end of April now! I also started looking into doing a trip to the Grand Canyon and thinking about a trip to Alaska that I plan to do in the Summer. Before that, we’re off to New York this coming Friday – for business and pleasure! I’m going for training, then taking an extra couple of days, and Jon’s coming with me!

We finished the weekend off at a party of a friend of a friend’s (Gami’s from Italian). It involved a game of post-Christmas White Elephant, which is where you take along a gift (something you have lying around the house and don’t really want), then swap it for another gift that someone has brought along. It’s great fun, as you also get to steal other people’s gifts! Apparently, it’s an American tradition, but definitely one that should be introduced to the UK.

More photos are available on the Fotki site: http://public.fotki.com/EllenHardwick/walks-late-dec--new/ (password: moocow)

Christmas and living the dream

We celebrated Christmas in English style by having a huge dinner comprising turkey with all the trimmings and Christmas pudding, watching the Queen’s speech over the internet and playing board games. There were ten of us in total, which meant starting the cooking at about 9 a.m. and working continuously for several hours to keep everybody fed and watered, but I’m not complaining as I enjoy it greatly: there are so many delicious components to Christmas dinner which make it very rewarding to cook. All the more so when you have an immense American oven and a cavernous American fridge, made for the job. It was a lovely day here, so the views from the apartment were great. In the evening, we had three more guests arrive, which heralded the game of White Elephant Secret Santa (Secret Santa with the added possibility of being able to steal other people’s gifts). A good time was had by all and the pics are available here: http://public.fotki.com/EllenHardwick/christmas-in-san-fran/ (password: moocow).

Health-wise, it wasn’t a very good week for me. I had no appetite after my food poisoning/stomach bug last Saturday night and didn’t start to want to eat again until Thursday. I also managed to catch a cold – probably as a result of having a low immune system and also as a result of people coming into work who should really stay home, but don’t because they don’t get paid, as there’s no sick pay system here. I was at work all week, apart from Tuesday, as there’s no concept of Boxing Day in the States, but it was pretty quiet. Jon had the week off and went to Napa with a couple of friends on Friday, touring the vineyards. I was seriously tempted to pull a sickie and go too, but didn’t in the end, mainly because the weather was really uninviting. He enjoyed himself, though, as for once someone else was driving. He ended up bringing back four bottles and a magnum of champagne.

Saturday was really poor weather-wise: drizzly and cold. We didn’t do a huge amount: food shopping, coffee at Caffè Sapore (thank God they do loyalty cards!), hat shopping (for Jon) at the amazing store on Washington Square, then a DVD in the afternoon. We watched a new film partly set in San Francisco, but aside from the stunning shots of the city, it wasn’t very good. In the evening, we took the cable car to a French restaurant I’d been wanting to try on Nob Hill. The food was very good, but I have now been sufficiently Americanised as to wonder where the rest of my portion was!

It dawned a beautiful morning today, so I made Jon get up and take me out running, as I felt better and wanted to do some exercise after all the slobbing around of the past week. For a change, we went in the car to Crissy Field, which is where we usually turn around when we run from the flat, and jogged from there along the waterfront to Fort Point, just under the Golden Gate Bridge, and back. A tour guide was regaling a group with grim tales of the bridge's suicides (at least two people jump every month). Spied a couple of pelicans, although I think that most of them have gone wherever they go for the winter now. There were also some crazy surfers and lots of dogs, as usual, many jogging with their owners. It was stunning.

After a hearty (late) breakfast, we drove to super-posh Seacliff in the West of the city and did a little walk from there. It’s one we’ve done many times, but this time we found a new path leading down to a beach strewn with the remains of a shipwreck. There were some wonderful viewpoints along the way, and the rocky beach was being dramatically pounded by huge waves in the afternoon sun. Someone had also been engaged in rock balancing, which only served to add to the rugged beauty of the place. En route, we saw dolphins leaping along on their way down the coast. Whenever I go to this area, I’m amazed by its sheer natural splendour, which is all the more surprising, given that it’s still in the “city”.

In the late afternoon, we headed downtown, first through North Beach, where we took a coffee at a café on Columbus, then through the heart of Chinatown down Grant Avenue. We went around a few shops but didn’t find anything, hampered by the eternal problems of shopping in the sales, so we caught the cable car back. For a change, we took the Powell-Hyde car, which I’d never been on before, but that’s the one that scales the most vertiginous hills. We got off at the top of Lombard Street, which is where the famously sinuous part is, and made our way down to the apartment, enjoying the night-time vistas over the city: the twinkling lights of Alcatraz, Coit Tower, the Bay Bridge and the skyscrapers of the financial district. People must be bored of me waxing lyrical about the place all the time, but I still feel like I’m in a dream or on a film set every time I step outside the door or even look out of my window. Every day is gorged with sensations, all within a few square miles.

Note that I'm sporting my new ski jacket in the picture, as well as my ear muffs (Christmas present!) from the cool shop on Washington Square.

Not an entirely Heavenly weekend

Eager to use our season lift passes for the first time, we headed up to Lake Tahoe on Friday night with a group of friends (eight of us in total, in two cars). We made it there safely, even though I was somewhat worried about the road conditions: it was pretty icy in places, and in fact the temperature went down as low as -14°C. Our motel was right by the lake, and we had a great “suite” that slept up to eight people, so it was perfect, except for the fact that the hot tub was out of action.

We awoke to a sunny morning on Saturday and went to get our lift passes and skis. This took ages – there were lots of people. Once we’d sorted all that out, it was up on the gondola (which affords truly amazing views over the lake as you head up) to take in the runs of the Heavenly ski resort (that’s its name, really). While it’s still quite early in the season, which meant that a few runs were closed, the snow was pretty good and we had a really nice day’s skiing. I managed not to fall over at all. Jon did a few times, but mainly when he was trying to be clever, by doing jumps, for example. It’s hard to describe just how incredible the views are from up there. You can look down to the vast lake on one side of the mountain range, then down much further to a huge expanse of plains on the other, probably about 7,000 feet below. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so I can’t share it with you!

In the evening, we had a curry that Chris (one of our party) had made, then went out to a bar in one of the casinos. They really are weird places. Interesting to take a look at, but far from being my cup of tea! Certainly a very different world from San Francisco, peopled by a wide variety of folk, some of whom could easily be rednecks and probably quite a few of whom vote for George Bush. I couldn’t believe how much hassle I was given trying to get into the bar. Now, to go into most bars in America, you need to show ID, even when you’re clearly over the minimum drinking age of 21. So, I always carry my UK driver’s licence around for that very purpose. However, they didn’t like that at Cabo Wabo (the Tahoe bar) and asked for U.S. issued ID. Well, it just so happened that I had my U.S. Department of Homeland Security Work Authorization card on me, because I’d brought it as photo ID for my lift pass, but the guy didn’t like that either and had to call his manager over. Bear in mind – all this is just to determine that I’m over the age of 21! Anyway, they finally let me in, but what a joke! Especially as I only ended up drinking water anyway!

Back at the motel, I had maybe a couple of hours’ sleep before waking up feeling nauseous. The rest of the night was spent on the toilet. I suppose I’ll never know what it was: food poisoning, stomach bug… even altitude sickness was suggested, but needless to say, Sunday was a complete write-off. Jon very sweetly went out to get me drinks and Imodium in the morning, and took my skis back, while I lay around unable to do anything. Everyone went off skiing, and all I could do was sit in the reception area (got kicked out of the room at 11:30 am), dropping off every now and then, until they all returned. At least it was a nice reception – sofas, fire pit, Christmas tree, view of lake and snowy mountains – but it didn’t compensate for missing a day of skiing in near perfect conditions. It was then a long drive back to San Francisco, with a dinner stop at a diner in Vacaville, followed by a very deep sleep for me!
I went to work today, while Jon did the shopping, picked up the turkey and made more mince pies. I got an emergency call at lunchtime because there were no brussels sprouts in Safeway or Trader Joe's, but I got lucky in the supermarket near my work. Tomorrow we’re catering for ten. It should be good fun – just hope I have some appetite back by then.

Not an especially blog-worthy weekend

Just a quick blog this time, as I don’t think there’s a huge amount to say. So, what have I done in the last week or so? Well, last Wednesday I went to see a friend from work play with his band in a bar, which was fun, although the lead singer was possibly the cheesiest guy on earth! On Thursday, I went to see a film at the Alliance Française, touted to be a French Christmas flick. Well, it was the usual stuff so typical of French films – lots of moodiness, infidelity and nothing really tied up at the end, but at least it was good for my language practice! Especially since I got to chat to work friend Elizabeth’s native speaker Algerian husband. Wow, that was a complex sentence!

On Saturday we did lots of cooking: Jon baked mince pies and I made two Christmas puddings. The mince pies are great – you’ll have to wait for a verdict on the puddings. In the evening it was my office Christmas party at a fairly upscale restaurant called “Paragon”, located south of Market Street. The food was great. We also had an open bar, which for me turned out to be not such a good idea. However, it was a fun night, even if it was then followed by the apparently post-thirty (trentagenarian?) concept of the two-day hangover, which was not so enjoyable. Don’t worry: I’ve vowed NEVER to do it again! So, not a great amount got accomplished on Sunday, but we did try out another North Beach Italian restaurant in the evening and then went to see the Christmas decorations downtown.

The other thing I did at the office party was invite three more people to Christmas dinner. I’m now up to ten! Yikes! Ordered a free-range turkey from the Farmer’s Market at the Ferry Building yesterday for pick-up on Christmas Eve. I’ll let you know how it goes!