San Francisco, Part One

I just returned from a fabulous trip to see my brother and his family in San Francisco, where they moved out there a year ago. This is the first chance I had to see their new lives, and I'm delighted to see how much they like it. My brother has given up his car commute for a more comfortable BART ride, they hike and ride bikes even more, and my newly-cosmopolitan eight-year-old niece declares that sushi is her favorite food.

If I plan this right, I'll be able to post vacation pictures several times this week, thereby buying me time to catch up on my email at work and the weeding in the garden.

California is suffering from a drought, so the landscape is dead brown hills punctuated by dark green trees and bushes.

I now understand what my parents went through with me. Like my niece, I was a voracious reader, carrying books around everywhere and only reluctantly tearing myself away from them to look up at the sites while we were out and about. Here we're waiting for the subway. K and I both like to read and walk, although I avoid doing it on busy city streets.

I had my first proper ramen, from a ramen shop, which we ordered as takeout and ate in Union Square. It was as delicious as I expected, since I love pretty much any kind of noodle.

My sister-in-law S was happy to humor me and visit a few touristy places. We had ice cream at Ghiradelli's chocolate shop. Note the ice cream on nose and chin - when you have to plow into an ice cream cone, you know you're enjoying it.

We also went to see the sea lions, but I had known that they migrate to Mexico in the summer. There was one, lone, old sea lion basking in the sun, and I got a kick out of a dozens of tourists gathered on a pier just to stare at one animal.