Saturday, December 17, 2011

Out and About


While I feel I am kind of crashing into the end of the year I have managed to do some fun things! Last night I went over to the East Bay and had dinner with some new folks I have met and then went to a Tori Amos concert. It was very cool, she's amazingly talented, the light show was great and I was very taken with the string quartet that accompanied her. Before the concert we had dinner at Pican restaurant, which bills itself as a "taste of the south". It was very good.
Two of the people I was with are involved in real estate and the third an attorney for a union......so it was lively conversation as they are all variously smart and people orientated.
Funniest moment was arriving and realizing I didn't know the last name of the person who booked the restaurant, fortunately the two others had arrived (and no I didn't know them prior). The Maitre d pointed them out so I walked up and introduced myself. It's moments like these that have me realize how much more confident I am in my social world. Navigating life here has pushed me to be far more outgoing in my interactions with people (I could easily have waited outside for the host to arrive....but didn't).
Irene has left for Australia which also means Lotte has left for Santa Cruz.....although she did stay with me one night. Marcia and her friend are staying upstairs so there are folks around. Three more working days to go then I leave my work laptop behind and to NZ for summer adventures!

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Dinner and drag

Friday night Irene, Connie and I headed out to dinner at Nojos, a fab little Japanese restaurant.
Chicken skin skewers
Yummiest Miso Soup ever

Tempura!

Connie preparing for the feast
Afterwards we headed off to Marlena's, a drag bar.....it was a riot.

And Connie again, with her very cool white bike!

Bar had 1100 santas festooned from floor to ceiling

The girls were fantastic!

Thursday, December 08, 2011

Quotable Quotes

American: "I love the way British people say Harding Park.....Jody say Harding Park in a British Accent"
Me: "I'm not British I don't know how they say it.....:
American: "No, no, just SAY it"
Me: "Harding Park"
American: "Yeah I love the way British people say that"

Monica about died laughing .....

This next one is NOT the first time I've been asked this.
Americans: "So it's summer in New Zealand in December?"
Me: "Yes"
Americans: "So what do you call it?"
Me: "What?"
Americans: "Well it's winter so what do you call summer....winter?"
Me: "What are you talking about? We call summer summer and winter winter.....we have all the seasons."
Americans: "So you don't call summer winter?....[long pause] oh, you must think we are really dumb and just think we are the center of the universe...."
Me: "Pretty much..."

Wednesday, December 07, 2011

Dinner

At Steve Jobs fav Japanese restaurant in Palo Alto



It was good....didn't see him....

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Sunday, December 04, 2011

More new toys

Irene decided "we" needed a leaf blower/vacuum and now we have it....





Lotte not quite so impressed....


She has better things to do with her time...



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OccupySF

Ran to the Ferry Terminal and checked out one of the OccupySF camps.


Can't say I really understand any of this......

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Thursday, December 01, 2011

Week is flying by....

And variously crawling along. Working from home today and tomorrow (yippee). Been busy organizing my NZ trip (double yippee) and hoping that NZ does have a summer while I am there. The "American's" aka my work colleagues, are ribbing me about going away for a month (that would actually be two weeks)...I have reminded them that they don't seem to know how to have real holidays. The average American can barely bring themselves to take a whole week off and think it entirely unacceptable that europeans (kiwis included) take months off at a time! Really funny, but they are, of course, all very envious.