Hiiiiiiiiiiii

[next_to_normal]

So, I seem to have disappeared for a while there? Mostly because I was on vacation, and I meant to make a post explaining my upcoming absence, but I was busy and never got around to it, and here we are on the other side, and now I'm just trying to catch up.

My mom and I went to San Francisco and points slightly south, all of which were lovely and wonderful and I want to live there and also be on vacation all the time. There were streets with stairs and drag queens and indoor thunderstorms and humpback whales and ice cream sundaes with Ghirardelli chocolate. Oh, and that time the cable car broke down and started rolling backwards down the hill and they had to call a tow truck to push us up over the hill. AND THEN THE TRUCK WASN'T BIG ENOUGH SO THEY HAD TO CALL A BIGGER ONE.

Basic itinerary:

Saturday - Tuesday: San Francisco, Alcatraz
Wednesday: Big Basin, Monterey
Thursday: Carmel, Point Lobos
Friday: 17 Mile Drive, Pebble Beach
Saturday: Whale watching
Sunday: Half Moon Bay

The flight home was a redeye and it was torturous and we shall speak of it no more. Pictures may happen, we'll see.

I'm not even going to attempt to linkspam everything that happened while I was gone. But a few links I did think were worth mentioning:

* A Smash post-mortem from one of the show's composers, which is hilariously honest and says a LOT about what was going on behind the scenes if you read between the lines, lol.

* Really cool set of maps that shows the differences between geographical dialects in the U.S.

Now it's your turn - how are you? What'd I miss?

Comments

[goldenusagi]

I've been to Carmel and Monterey!

[next_to_normal]

Cool! How'd you like it? We thought Carmel was a little too cutesy and not enough to do, haha, but we liked Monterey quite a bit.

[goldenusagi]

Well, it's been a while, I was practically a kid. (But now I can say that that I'd probably be fine walking around Carmel and looking at cutesy stores.)

But we visited my aunt. We went to the beach, (prettier to look at than swim in), went to the redwood forest, drove around the coast, and went to the aquarium in Monterey.

[next_to_normal]

Haha, yeah, the water is cooooold. We saw people in the water, but they must have been crazy...

Oh, the aquarium, lol. Everyone at the B&B we stayed at kept telling us how wonderful the aquarium is and how we had to go... and my mom and I were like, how different can it really be from other aquariums? So we skipped it.

[goldenusagi]

I wouldn't know, I've never been to another aquarium, lol. Oh wait, when I was in London, I did go to that one, and it was not as impressive as Monterey's. But my uncle had a degree in marine biology, so it was like a guided tour, lol.

[next_to_normal]

I think I skipped the one in London, too, lol.

We've been to the National Aquarium, which is supposed to be one of the best. Plus, the one in Camden, despite being located in the worst city ever, isn't bad and it was close to where I grew up (I had my junior prom there).

[frayadjacent]

Sounds like a fun trip! I went to SF last winter for a couple days and had a great time. I was surprised by how big-city it felt! I'd been to Oakland several times in the last few years -- it is in many ways much more like Seattle than SF is (or at least the gentrified/ing parts of Oakland that I saw are). SF felt much more like an East Coast city to me.

Being on a broken-down cable car on a San Francisco hill sounds exciting/SCARY, but sounds like it worked out fine, if not amusingly. :D

[next_to_normal]

It was fun! Even the broken-down cable car, lol. SF is the first west coast city I've been to, so I don't know how they compare to the east otherwise, but I did notice that people in SF were a lot more polite than I'm used to!

[mcmegan]

You should go to Seattle. I wanted to move there when I visited. I would love to go to San Fransisco though (outside of the airport, at least).

[next_to_normal]

Seattle is on my list! (Perhaps as part of an Alaska cruise? A girl can dream...)

San Francisco was a lot of fun! Too bad we couldn't meet up while you were stranded in the airport, but I was locked up on Alcatraz that day, lol.

[vergoldung.livejournal.com]

Babe, you're back \o/!!! I'm so glad you had a nice trip <3

I'm a bit weird, sporadically internet!social, but I'm trying my best to get back on track.

[next_to_normal]

I misssssssed youuuuuuuu! Be as weird as you want, as long as you come talk to me, hehe.