an introduction to the city and a relative

I am awake early and I am excited to make something of all the food I bought yesterday. I wake up and make myself an omelet with broccoli, spinach, onion, goat cheese, and tomato. For the first time in a while my omelet looks like an omelet and it tastes SO good. When I finish my omelet, I get ready for my day. I am meeting my 2nd cousin twice removed (or something like that...he is my mother's mother's cousin...my late grandmother Ruth Greenlaw's cousin), who lives here in the city. I take the bus down to Market Street and the Castro Station and meet him (Steve) and his partner. We wander about the Castro and Mission neighborhoods and eat a restaurant specializing in crepes. I eat a scrumptious cheese, mushroom, and almond crepe and then share a nutella, banana, and ice cream dessert crepe. The weather is an interesting mix of rain, wind, and general gray overtone to the sky so we tour the city by car. The city is so varied, each neighborhood having its own distinct personality. Amongst the sights, I see: the Mission (one of the older buildings in San Francisco), Robin William's house, the Golden Gate Bridge, Twin Peaks (a great overlook of the city), the Presidio, Crissy Field (once an airplane runway, now a beautiful area with walking paths), Fort Point (underneath the Golden Gate Bridge, where some scenes from Vertigo were shot), Palace of Fine Arts (built for the World's Fair, in the process of being repaired, lots of people come to have wedding photos taken here), and we drive by the zoo (where that tiger escaped on Christmas day, killing innocent tourists). I return to the apartment I am staying in, to find that Reena and Kate are preparing for a potluck we are invited to tonight. The weather is predicted to get nastier tonight, so that is definitely a better option than watching the Chinese New Year Parade downtown (which I was very much looking forward to), so we decide on the potluck. Together, we scrape together the ingredients for a carrot dish and get busy in the kitchen preparing our food. The potluck is great fun and I meet some interesting people. We have fun pigging out on tacos, chocolate ganache cake, and homemade lentil soup. We talk until about 2:30 am before Reena and I head back five blocks to her apartment and I fall into a deep slumber.

It feels good to be exploring the city in a car. I can appreciate its beauty and stay dry. I like that.