Wednesday, June 06, 2007

more vacation stories

The Anchor Steam Brewery was a blast. I highly recommend it should you ever go to San Francisco. And do bring a friend. I would have enjoyed it on my own, but had a wonderful experience having gone with a friend. They have one tour a day and take no walk-ins so do make a reservation in advance. It's a small group which is nice because after you tour the entire complex (where they, from top to bottom, brew and bottle the beer), you get to sample six of their different beers. Everyone gets a half-pint glass (reminding some of their time in the UK), and cheers. I had to drink less than a half-pint a sample as I was not going straight to bed, but everything was delicious and it was such fun to try the various brews having learned all about them.

Afterwards, Michelle and I went to North Beach and hit City Lights. What a bookstore! And I loved the poetry room. I got a call from my friend Paloma while I was there and she indeed lives very close to Rachel. We're hopefully meeting up this evening. I got Diane DiPrima's memoir, "The Subterraneans" by Kerouac and a book of collected poems by Denise Levertov. I could have stayed longer and bought more, but I tried keeping the book buying to a minimum.

That night, I went to dinner with Rachel's colleagues, one of whom lives in SOMA in a building that looks like Erdman (for those of you in the know). Clearly, we lived on the cutting edge of design. Being mawrtyrs, we preferred collegiate gothic. Oh well.

Yesterday, I had breakfast on Valencia Street with my old friend SW from Sacred Heart. She is doing so well and her fiance is very kind and warm-hearted. It was great catching up. She's the same person she was when I met her at age 6, but so much happier and full of life. It's so great to be in touch.

Afterwards, I headed downtown to the SF MoMA and roamed the entire museum. Of note was an exhibition of photos by Martin Munkacsi. I wrote a lot in the museum and really enjoyed that time of contemplation.

After, I wandered around and ended up at the Ferry Building after going to Stacey's bookstore which was excellent. I love bookstores that provide recommendations written up by the staff. These recs filled the cards. Always a good sign that you are in the presence of people who love books.

At the Ferry Building, I not only admired the view of the Bay Bridge, but also combed over all the food and specialty items. I came away with a Cowgirl Creamery teeshirt and a lavender eye mask for napping. I've ALWAYS wanted one of those.

Tonight, I'll probably see Paloma and hopefully Rachel will be able to leave work early. I'm not sure what I'm going to do but it's still early and I'll most likely spend some time writing and reading over coffee and pastries at Tartine.

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