Last weekend I jetted down to lovely C-A-L-I to visit my bestie, Jaime. She’s subletting a sweet piece of house, perched over the estuary that runs through Alameda. It was like staying on a houseboat, only the houseboat was attached.

I didn’t get the sunshiney Valhalla I’d expected since it rained 90% of the time I was there, but that was fine. I caught some sunshine my first morning there as we drank boozy coffee on the huge porch. When it did rain, it was often in big, gusty sheets; watching the rain pound the water outside the window was fun, but seeing the poor birdies trying to fly against the wind wasn’t so great. Poor seagulls.

We had some excellent meals, including a lunch at the new branch of Burma Superstar which was just blocks from Jaime’s place! We also had some heavenly burritos and some ridiculously delicious french macaroons.

We watched two scary movies: Orphan and Paranormal Activity. We watched Orphan because it featured our mutual movie boyfriend Peter Sarsgaard. The plot to this one was fun and creative and I enjoyed that they took the time to build up a good story with interesting characters. Paranormal Activity wasn’t half as scary as I’d set it up to be, but it did give me the willies in a few spots. We also watched Up in the Air. I found it kinda depressing, but there were some interesting moments.

The last night I was there we stopped by the house of a friend of Jaime’s: we had some lovely wine (okay a lot of lovely wine) and hung out with the couple and their 9-year-old son who RULED. So often kids are left at home when parents go to visit or put down to sleep in a bedroom when company is over, but this family had their son hanging out with us for most of the evening. It was so fun – we played Spongebob SORRY! and drew pictures and giggled and played hide and seek. Seeing a well adjusted kid enjoying time with his parents yet letting them be adults and have conversations was pretty awesome.

We had plans to visit San Francisco and maybe drop in on some friends, but Monday morning we both woke with awful hangovers. I guess we aren’t 23 anymore. The storm was raging outside so we ordered pizza delivery and sat around chatting. We never left the 94501 zip code and I’m not one bit sorry. It felt like old times when we both lived in the city – back then we didn’t spend our time jetting from place to place trying to mark things off of a list. We just talked. Slept in. Read books together.

I came home, feeling a bit lonely but happy to see Sky. Then I was in Jury Duty for 2 days and got the worst haircut of my life. Both those things will have to wait for another post…

RolllLLLlllLLLLlllling blackouts in California.
I wonder if Oscar is confused. I usually leave one small light on for him because by the time I get home from work it’s dark out. He’s a cat and can see nicely in the dark, but I think it freaks him out when the lights are all off – he thinks I’m not coming home.

California is weird.
Usually I don’t really recognize the fact that I live in this state. I was never a big fan of California growing up. I think of San Francisco as a little island unto itself.
I say California is weird because last night some guy drove his 18 wheel truck (full of evaporated milk) into the capitol building in Sacramento. It made a big big explosion. Apparently he honked his horn a few times before he did this, then went full speed ahead. No one knows what he was protesting – was it the Timothy McVeigh execution? The energy bill that State Congress was voting on? The Bush inaguration? (Okay, that’s my own suggestion)

I guess New York is weird, too. They just had a 2.5 earthquake this morning. Epicenter right in the middle of New York City. I don’t know why I think that’s so peculiar, but I do.