More fun in San Francisco!

I finally got around to buying a replacement cord so I could download stuff from my camera.
I'll keep the words minimal and just let the videos and photos do their thing.

On my first weekend in the new place I went for a walk to check out some shops...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KubLO4IY0ww


Wonderful flowers grow randomly along the sidewalk all year round!
And nearby parks have amazing views.





And this is the park atop the hill, of which, I live at the bottom.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKz5PacuenM

Interesting moments

So there is a collection of events I've observed since coming to San Francisco that I just feel like I should share. There's really not much more to say about any of these, they're just odd, or interesting if either of those is the right word.

I've discovered that Public Transit is always good for a story. Case in point. On my way to a 10am meeting downtown, I boarded the bus around 9. Drunk man in the back started to get a little loud and I felt like I was in school again when the bus driver called him up to the front. She spoke to him a bit and then when he got back to the rear of the bus began yelling again. He was absolutely convinced that "The n----- stole my money!" Then the bus driver kicked him off. Drunk and disorderly at 9am. WOW.

Walking through the Castro on a Saturday night passing several bums begging I turn the corner and there is a man completely naked. Strike that, he was wearing a stocking hat with tassel. He just stood there. didn't say anything, didn't do anything, just stood. then wandered up the street a bit to stand there.

Probably my favorite was overhearing the bitchy-est little gay boy I've ever seen complaining very loudly to his friends about the cover at the club they were entering. It was TWO DOLLARS!

Finally, if I had been more drunk I DEFINITELY would have taken part in this last one. Outside a bar around 1am there was a middle aged latino man and woman with a grill on the sidewalk selling tacos. Seriously, that is like the best entrepreneurial business model ever. Someone needs to back them.

Well that's all for now. More later.

Settling in.

So I found an apartment!
I'm now a resident of Bernal Heights in San Francisco.
It's a quiet neighborhood, mostly residential, with a great little main drag of shops, library and AMAZING looking restaurants.
Seriously within a 10 minute walk there is a tacqueria, nepalese, thai, italian, japanese, 3 coffee shops, ice cream, a wine bar, 3 regular bars, and 2 kind of standard american cuisine places.
I'm loving it and I can't wait to eat at them all.
I have a feeling this may soon turn into a food blog.
Oh well.


More on the apartment soon!

Have I done something lately to make you think I'm stupid?

Sometimes I am annoyed at how often certain people I don't care to remember are brought up in my memory.

Recently at my new job a co-worker has shown that he regularly goes through painfully specific and detailed descriptions of very basic tasks. I've been at the job for almost 2 weeks and already have wanted to scream at him "I'M NOT A FUCKING IDIOT!"
The sad part of it all is that this reminds me of people who would love, no, NEED that level of specificity. I'm not going to get too deep into it, but already I can see that I'll need to develop a special way of working with this individual if only to maintain my sanity.

ROAD TRIP!!

So I LOVE road trips.

I had a great one on my way out to California.

It happened fast, I loaded my shit up in my car and took off.

Three days of travel and I'm in CA and have already started my new job.

I took some videos along the way.

Interview!!

So This weekend I flew out to San Francisco for an interview.

I'm still waiting to hear from them afterwards but overall it went well and they paid some travel costs.

I stayed with Rachel and her family who were VERY kind to put me up for a couple nights. But we had good fun and Rachel took me around town to explore some neighborhoods. I learned a few things, not the least of which was that a neighborhood with either "hill" or "heights" in it's name is NEVER flat. Also "flat" by San Francisco standards is an interesting concept.

The organization I interviewed with was in an interesting location...

(I used my new flip video for the first time. Sorry, it's a little jerky.)

All in all, the interview went well I think. What was scheduled to be 3 hours lasted 5 because we just kept talking. I had fun chatting with three of the staff members there and had a great trip. We'll see how it turns out.

The Dreaded RETAIL!

So to occupy myself during this time of job searching and seemingly endless cover letters I have started working at my brothers shoe store. I'll admit I was a bit wary in the beginning. The thought of working for the person who, more often than not it seems, delighted in creating a tormented childhood for me was less than appealing. So far that hasn't been the problem.

What HAS been the problem you ask?

I could use one word, but I'll use two for emphasis and clarity.

FUCKING IDIOTS!

Ok. I can understand people not having a full grasp of how their feet are put together, how a shoe interacts with the various joints of your lower extremities, how European or children's sizing works, or even not being sure about their shoe size. Much of this I have learned very quickly in the past few weeks. But there is no excuse for some people being just plain idiotic. No I take that back, not plain.... fucking idiotic.

When a steel toed boot is so narrow in comparison to your foot that the edge of the curved steel plate is grinding into your toes and the outer side of your foot, getting a narrower shoe is NOT a good idea. When you think you have some horribly abnormal condition (bunions) and the store clerk tells you its actually quite common and we can work around it fairly easily, continuing to try on enormously large shoes and whining about how awful it is that no one can help you find a better fitting shoe is really NOT a good idea. Coming in three different times to look at the same shoe and trying to haggle down the price with two separate clerks while getting nowhere each time is just really annoying.

In the end this is a very small segment of the population (at least I keep telling myself that). But they have a knack for making their presence known to all again, and again. Sometimes I worry about the future of humanity.