Call It What You Want...

Tim and I are back from our trip to San Francisco (Tim for work, me coming later for some fun)... The boys stayed with Grandma and Grandpa and regaled them with fun and, oh, yeah, a little bit of under-the-weather, too.

But, In the meantime, WE were off having fun.

I arrived on Thursday and spent a little time wandering around the Union Square area (where the hotel was), finding, to my joy, this lovely sight. Eat your heart out, Mel, Mer, Laura, etc. Yeah. It was lovely. I ended up with some ribbon for a bonnet I'm working on. And I didn't even get back to the fourth floor. Sigh. Next time.

Tim got to the hotel and we went off for a walk north on Stockton to Pier 39, the tourist-heavy part of Fisherman's Wharf (about 2.5 miles). We found a seafood restaurant, which was what I wanted, ate there, and then took a cab home, enjoying some of the steeper hills of the route.

The next morning, Tim was off to work, and I was off to the Pinecrest Diner for some breakfast, not interested in what the hotel had to offer at horrifying prices.

The Pinecrest was just what I was after -- typical diner food, nothing near $25 (what a similar meal, except with more garnishes, I imagine, would have cost at the hotel). Yum. I love breakfast. Then a wander about and, yes, a ride on the cable car down to Fisherman's Wharf for my bus tour.

This is the same sort of open-top bus that we took in London; a nice way to see the city and not have super-sore feet (more on that later). And yes, I saw all the sights:

steep streets (that's Lombard Street), a fog-shrouded downtown, a fog-shrouded Bay Bridge, the city center... etc. You get the idea. Got off at Union Square Macy's, had a snack (that turned out to be lunch) and then hit the SF Museum of Modern Art. All I can say is "I don't get it."

There was a blue fluorescent light mounted at an angle on the wall. That was art. Looks to me like someone didn't have his level. There was a string of lightbulbs plugged into an outlet in the corner. That, too, was art. There was a three-panel piece, all three panels painted white, no texture, no nothing. Art? Sorry to be dense. I didn't get it. All I got from that was the blue glow from the art piece next to it (the first piece mentioned).

There was also an exhibit that featured a super-fancy BMW stripped down and encased in ice. This was kept in a gallery where the temperature was 12 degrees F. Yeah. My nose hairs froze. I wrapped myself in the provided blanket and went in and looked around...

And it looked like a prehistoric crustaceon. Weird. I left off my blanket and went on to see the works of Joseph Cornell, who put weird collections of random stuff together in little boxes. Thousands of them.

From the SFMOMA: "A self-taught artist, Joseph Cornell relied almost exclusively on found materials. He collected items from books, newspapers, second-hand stores, exploratory walks — even sweepings from his studio floor — to create intricate, elaborate box constructions and collages. These enchanting works of art transformed commonplace objects into extraordinary and magical dreamscapes, earning him immediate and enduring respect as a sort of artistic alchemist."

Okay. Enough. For more of that location, see their website.

Then it was back on the hop-on-hop-off bus, except it didn't make the SFMOMA stop, so I speed-walked back up to Macy's, where I knew they would stop. They did. Back on for the rest of the tour, except they'd left someone back at the City Center, so we had to take a short-cut detour to get them, and ended up back at Fisherman's Wharf, where I went to the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. I had a walking tour of the pier with a ranger and saw the ships from the pier (I would go back later with Tim to board them. Didn't want to do all the fun without him.)

My favorite was

 

The Balclutha. To learn more about this cool ship, see here. After that, I talked with their volunteer who is in charge of the historical clothing for the few costumed interpretation events they do. Yeah. That took a while. She thinks my Prairie is wonderful and amazing and fabulous. (Don't think she's ever been there... but the fact that I do costumed historical interpretation was enough to make her excited enough to almost wet herself.)

Back to the hotel to meet Tim, off to a restaurant recommended by the SF co-worker he'd been around all week. Unfortunately, we missed the turn and ended up walking about an extra mile (total due to the error: 2 3/4 miles; total had we gone the right way: under 1 1/2) but found ourselves at the Tadich Grill.

(This is a photo from the internet. That table, there on the left, that's where we sat.)

Huh. funny what you find when you check the internet. There's even a BOOK!

Then back to the hotel to bed. This is the night -- well, early morning -- that I stubbed my toe on one of my shoes and ended up with a black toe for the rest of the weekend. And now.