The Giants...and Giant Beers

I'm a little behind on blogging; Alan and I attended this Giants game when Barry Bonds was only at 750 home runs. But better late than never! Back in those days, Alan still had his freedom from the daily grind, and we had the time for fun activities. Now "we're" in the thralls of grant-submission time, so Alan's a little busier. Like 90 hours a week busier, and that's no lie. But, once upon a time, we headed up to San Francisco on a weekend to go to a Giants game. The Caltrain allows alcoholic beverages on board, I mean, they practically advertise the fact, so who were we not to take advantage? Here, Alan with a 40, and me, with a mere 32, faking that I have a 40.





When we got to AT&T Park, we were walking by an ATM and happened upon the ONE person in the entire region that we knew. Alan fake-demanded all of his money, and Joe, thinking we were the guy he was meeting, barely flinched. When he finally did look up and realize it was Alan, a joyous reunion was had by all. Enhanced, I think, by Alan and me being a little tipsy. You would have thought he was our long-lost best friend from first grade. We were so excited to see a familiar face! Yay for Joe!

The park is very cool. Here, the outfield.



Here's Barry Bonds up to bat.



While Double B didn't hit a home run this game (he was thisclose to one though), people are always out in the bay, anticipating the homer.



Now, I know how cold it was in the stadium, so I can only imagine how cold it is on the water, without people or walls blocking the wind. If you EVER go to a game in SF, no matter how warm it feels, no matter if it's the middle of July, bring your winter coat. I had on two hooded sweatshirts, and that was not enough. Alan froze in his long sleeves. You've been warned.




We were very glad we'd had those beers on the train, because beer at the park of course cost a fortune. We did load up on hot dogs and fries loaded up with more garlic than I've ever seen in a single paper tray.



Although we didn't see any home runs, we did have a great time at the game. We headed back on our friend the Caltrain, and I proceeded to take a picture of the moon when we got home.



This picture serves as a reminder to me that, no matter how pretty a moon, sunset, or sunrise, pictures never do it justice, so just refrain.

Crazy Pug Mode

Every now and then Marti goes into Crazy Pug Mode. It used to manifest itself with the "zoomies," also known as "racing around a million miles an hour." I read somewhere that the zoomies typically occur at night, when puppies are trying to get out their last bit of energy. Now that Marti's a big girl, the zoomies happen less and less. It's only on occasion that she gets the wild look in her eye and goes Pug Wild. It happened last night when I was walking her. She started jumping up and racing around and trying to bite me and trying to grab the baggie from my hand. She also takes hold of the leash and tries to wrestle it from me. It cracks me up, but drives me a little mad at the same time. To top it off, her potty spot is a big grassy patch right in front of an assisted living facility. There are always folks sitting out on the patio, I'm sure watching my out-of-control mongrel trying to rip her leash, and occasionally me, apart.

Alan is also quite good at getting Marti to kick into Crazy Gear. It only takes him a minute of rough-housing with her before she's making ferocious-sounding growls and running around full speed. Here is Alan getting Marti all worked up into a frenzy. The before shot, if you will:



As you can see, Marti is alert, primed and ready for action. The next shot is of Marti taking a punch to the face. I assure you that no pugs were harmed in the making of this shot.

No Place Like Home

I've been AFB (away from blog...I just made that up) for the past week because I've been a crazy-busy jetsetter. It all started last Friday when I headed off to Vegas for the weekend. It was an absolute blast, and even though I left Vegas on Sunday, I don't think I was fully recovered until Tuesday. From the City of Sin, I headed back home for a short visit, which was great! Being able to work from home has definite advantages, so I was able to get a 3-day visit without taking any vacation days. I was so glad to see my family and some wide open spaces. When I was done in Kansas, I had to head back to California for a short stopover. I got in on Wednesday night, and Thursday morning I had to get up and get back to the airport to go to Long Beach for a work conference. While heading to my hotel, I got to see the Queen Mary, which I didn't even know was in Long Beach.



The work conference went well, but I was so glad to be heading home on Friday night for good. After Alan picked me up, we went to a very late dinner. It was confirmed that I was back in crazy Cali when the server brought us seven straws for two glasses of water. You just never know when you'll need backup straws.



I am so glad to be home, on the ground, after five flights in seven days. Even though Alan stole the car from me today without telling me thus leaving me stranded at home all day. I wasn't the only one who was glad I was back home again. Alan and Marti were very glad to return to normalcy.



And here's Marti, looking at a map, trying to figure out what happens when Alan and I leave the house.

More things you don't see in Kansas

I’ve been made aware that not all of my blog readers know that you can click on pictures to make them bigger. Two pictures in particular are more effective when you click on them to enlarge: 1) the sea lions of my last post and 2) Marti’s captain destructo goat with horn. When you enlarge food, it’ll probably just make it look more delicious.

Alan and I recently managed to find a Mexican restaurant that wasn’t out-of-control expensive. They served some tasty margaritas and some tasty food on plates the size of Texas.



The margaritas packed a punch, so much of a punch apparently, that the restaurant has this gumball machine on the way out:



If you can’t see even after enlarging, it says that the gum “helps cover alcohol breath,” and “it’s just not worth the risk if you’ve had a drink.” Not worth the risk, so use gum to cover your foul drunk breath and get in your car anyway? The gum doesn’t sober you up, it only hides the smell. Although we weren’t driving, we did try the gum out. I’m not sure if it worked; I was too drunk to tell.



Speaking of drunk, Alan and I did get unintentionally a little too tipsy one night at a bar in town. It started out with beers at a local burger/deviled egg joint in town, and then we decided to class our night up a bit and stop for a glass of wine on the way home. We started out with wine, and got talking to a local who transplanted from Boston 25 years ago and never left. One glass of wine led to another, to a beer, and to, well, this:



The bartenders wanted to make sure we left happy, and that we did. A little too happy. So happy that I probably won't drink that much again for awhile, intentionally or not.

And just so you all don’t think that drink is all that we do, here’s proof that we do get out and do normal things, like go to Target. This is a two-story Target, and this is how you get your cart up or down to the next floor:



I'm obviously quite proud to be the dork-about-town taking pictures of all the things that make me go "Gaww-lee."

Watchin' the sun set in Monterey

A couple of weekends ago, Alan and I headed down to Monterey for the day. Side note: If you're a country fan and you visit the town, Tim McGraw's song will be running through your head the entire time. We really wanted to take Marti as well and stay the night, but because of a blues festival in town that weekend, hotels were pretty pricey and/or sold out. It's only about 90 miles away, so we decided to make a day of it. We got there and as always, were surprised by the low temperatures. End of June and we were seriously chilly. I still see ocean and beach and think "warm." I really must to adapt my mindset and remember that we're in NorCal (another term used by us locals), not SoCal. Here is a shot of the Casual Island store near the beach. As you can see, heavy coats are on display. Alan almost bought one. Oh, and coats and jackets are the one thing you can find really cheap in California.



After we hit up the Old Wharf, ate barely tolerable fish and chips (which means "almost induced Alan's vomiting") and failed to buy kettle corn because of a high demand and low-and-slow supply, we headed off to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We thought it was just a block or two away from where we were, so we kept walking on. It was a lovely walk along the water and we spied some sea lions.



This was especially amusing because I kept saying, "Look at that sea lion!" thinking there was one lone sea lion. No! If you can see from the picture, almost every rock has one or two sea lions sunbathing on it. Fooled me!

We kept walking along the water on a touristy sidewalk, Alan in his flip flops (which meant much complaining), waiting to find the aquarium. We walked for what felt like miles* before we finally got there. We seriously couldn't believe how far it was; we'd walk by maps with "You are here" stickers and each time we got to one we'd barely gone anywhere. Luckily, the walk was gorgeous and I'm accustomed to wearing flip flops.



The aquarium was very cool. Lots of...fish. But seriously, it was awesome, with jellyfish and "drifter" displays, a sea otter exhibit (those suckers are adorable), and plenty of sharks and other sea creatures. I even got to touch a sting ray, which was very slimy feeling. We were going to drive down to Pebble Beach, which is very close to Monterey, but it was a $9 toll and we didn't have any cash on us. We'll do that next time when we've got Martikins in tow!

The next morning, a Sunday, we got up at about 8 a.m. Why, you ask? We had to go get a Wii. Had to. You see, even though the gaming console has been out for about 7 months, demand still way outnumbers supply. We had learned that Best Buy was getting a shipment in, and we had to arrive before the store opened to have a shot at getting one. So when we got there, a line had already formed. A young lad informed us that the store was getting 14 Wiis, and there were 14 already in line. Great. All for nothing, we think. Then I suggested that since we were already up we might as well go to another Best Buy we knew of and see what was going on there. So we did. And there was a line there as well, but no one knew how many Wiis the store was getting. The ad said they were going to get at least 9. We were about 15 in line, so we figured it was a lost cause. Here is the line ahead of us:



We're there at about 9, 9:15, thinking they open at 10 like the other store. However, no, they didn't open until 11! We had quite a wait. During that time, more people showed up. The line behind us:



Finally, a Best Buy rally or employee meeting ends, and employees start streaming out of the store. One of them says "You all here for the 10 Wiis we have? Just playin'!" Ha. Anyway, a Wii official, trained in dealing with mobs I'm sure, comes out and says they have 36 Wiis. 36! In our wildest dreams we wouldn't have thought they would be getting that many. Needless to say, we were in the safe zone and able to lay our hands on the toy. It is actually really fun to play; when you play tennis you actually swing your arm to hit the ball. When you box, you actually punch. I won't even tell you how sore I was after boxing. Actually, I will. I was REALLY sore. If we had any friends I'm sure they'd come over to play our Wii all the time. Our new slogan: Come visit, we have a Wii! Wheee!

By the way, for those of you thinking our life is all leisure, have no fear. It came to an end on Monday when Alan went back to work. Alan had to start making a living once again, and with just my check rolling in we were going broke living the vacation-a-week life!

*I looked it up: the walk was 1.7 miles there and 1.7 miles back to our car.