Last couple days in San Francisco

A couple days worth of notes:

On Wednesday, we had lunch at The Ramp. It's located just off Third Street by the Waterfront. According to Adam, the best thing about The Ramp is that for a restaurant on the water, it's a pretty well-kept secret from tourists. It's not far past AT&T Park (where the Giants play) and near the Portrero area of the city. The reason it might be kept so secret is that that part of the city, at the surface, isn't much to look at. A lot of it is under construction, as developers are betting it will be "the next big neighborhood" in San Francisco.

In the afternoon, we drove around the city and looked at potential neighborhoods for me to live in. Now: a word about my brother's driving. It's a bit on the aggressive side. His Volkswagen Passat is a standard, and he shifts in and out of lanes and swears and curses and pretty much lives by the Lynch mantra of driving with a sense of entitlement, if not anger.

We looked at the Haight Ashbury, which is a section I've wanted to live in since reading the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe about Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters when I was in high school. While it has kept the bohemian feel you read about, it's kind of J-Crew, tourist hippy at this point, where a lot of it seems contrived. That said, the residential parts have amazingly constructed homes with colorful paint and wonderful moldings.

Near the Haight is the Cole Valley area, which would be near transportation that would take me toward my work rather easily.

Afterward, we drove up along the Presidio and then back down to the bay where I went and looked at the Golden Gate, yet again. I thought about the scene in Vertigo where Jimmy Stewart follows Kim Novak and jumps in after her.


Yesterday:

Adam and I drove down to Burlingame in the afternoon and played golf at Crystal Springs, a course that overlooks, even in December, verdantly green hills. It runs along Buri Buri Ridge of the old San Mateo Rancho, and if you hook a ball a little too far, you could watch it fall down into the valley that where the 20-mile-long Crystal Springs Reservoir (and under it, part of the San Andreas fault) resides.

It was cold, though (in the forties), and we found ourselves blowing into our hands to keep warm and it stung to feel the vibrations of the club if you didn't hit the ball square (which, seeing as I hadn't played in a couple months, happened every now and again). We drank some Pilsners to keep warm and kept the windshield down on the golf cart.

In the evening, I took the muni downtown (to the financial district) and met Ben for dinner and drinks, which was a good time. With his wife due soon, I'd purchased a Red Sox onezie (sp) that I hope the little one will get good use from. Ben was pleased, saying it's the best possible baby gift I could have gotten them, so that was nice.

Afterward, I went back to the flat on Hyde Street my parents are renting, had a glass of wine and went to bed.