Shawn Blathering

Seriously?

I mean, is this supposed to be ironic, or what?

I'll carve off what I want, and ride the rest home, thank you.

20 oz Kansas Strip, Queue de Cheval Steakhouse, Montreal, Quebec

Has the Dalai Lama ever seen Caddyshack?

EDIT: No

Had a reasonably nice sleep interrupted by the alarm, prodding me to go move the car before it got ticketed. After waking Jenn, we got ready and headed to what turned out to be a delicious bagel place on Mission. From there, we headed north towards the Golden Gate Bridge, which still retains some majesty, despite my having seen it probably close to a thousand times in various media. Surprisingly, felt a little shorter than I would have expected. We stopped at the vista point on the north side to take some shots of the city, but there was still too much morning haze clinging to it to make the shots worthwhile.

Got up into Marin County, and followed the twisty road up to Muir Woods. The fog/haze had burned off by this point, but the towering trees kept the air pleasantly cool, although a bit too cold for Jenn.

We followed the one mile trail, that wound through some gorgeous scenery. Kept a sharp lookout for Biker Scouts, but I think we passed undetected. It's certainly one thing to see a cross section of a redwood, and be told it's a wide, tall tree; and quite another to stand at the base and see them soaring towards the sun. It's also weird to see a grove of saplings dancing in the sun, and know that maybe only two of them will outstrip the others at some point, cutting them off from the nurturing rays, eventually dooming them to die and fade back into the soil, eventually feeding the roots of the victors.

On the way back, we stopped for a third round of In-n-Out, and consigned the El Feracito trip for tomorrow, and 86'd the dim sum until the next time.

Prepping now for a trip for Chinese, to Sam Lok. I don't know that I've ever had proper Sizchuan. If Bourdain's experience on No Reservations is any indication, maybe I should bring a mopping rag. Survivor's report to follow.

Pondering: Ship some clothes and knick-knacks home?

There is only one CVS in the city of San Francisco.

On my flight from BWI to Hartford, the Southwest stewardess dropped off two bags of peanuts. Without particularly paying attention, I opened the first bag, poured some into my hand, and threw them back - and almost gagged them back up. I looked in my hand, and there was salt. Now, I'm not talking like, "oh, yeah these peanuts were too salty". I'm talking, "I'm holding the remains of Carthage".

Too bad I had already finished my drink. I suppose that with the tens of millions of bags of peanuts, odds are that over-salting would take place, though not that often. But I'll still be eyeing my peanuts more carefully from now on.

Stephen Wright performing an evening of Jeffrey Wright sermons.

Without me asking for them, the Nationals sent me two tickets to tonight's annual exhibition game versus the Orioles. Eric couldn't go, so Jenn eagerly accepted, just for the chance to see the new park. We drove to Foggy Bottom and parked, then metroed to the game.

Getting off the Metro, I immediately spotted one problem. The "renovated" Navy Yards station only had two escalators leaving the platform. The RFK stop had three. So already I think speed of egress from the platform will be reduced by 1/3rd. (Note: the tail end of the Green Line train is where to be to have quickest access to the escalator) As we took the next set of escalators to street level, a female Metro employee yelled at people to stay to the right on the very uncrowded steps. Like, really yelled. She wouldn't let you walk past anyone. Just like D.C. Making things as inefficient as possible.

Continue reading "First Glance, Nationals Park or: We're Going To Need A Bigger Chili Bowl" »

From the box score of the Sox-A's game at the Tokyo Dome this morning:
Attendance: 44,628 (131% full)

I guess MacArthur forgot to introduce fire marshals to post-war Japan.