Where Happy is the Main Ingredient

I met a new friend downtown for lunch today, in a break from my regular routine of having lunch in my office on campus. Sort of a celebration of not having any concerts today to have to worry about, which is certainly rare in mid-October. But mostly just a pleasant and convenient excuse to break outside of my box and play hooky for a little bit. It turned into a three-hour sojourn. It felt like a Friday. It still feels like Friday. But it's not. It's Thursday.

Anyways.

We dined at a place called Mendocino Farms, which is simply a code-word title for "sandwich shop". Possibly the fanciest sandwich shop I've ever dined at. From their website: "Our creative sandwiches, salads, and more take you on an unexpected culinary adventure with fresh ingredients and fearless flavor combinations."

Fearless? Well it was a good sandwich. It should have feared me, because I ate it right down. And it's all set in a gentrified area called Richmond Grove (at least that's what Apple Maps calls it) set around S Street and 16th.

And the eatery is in a line of shops of various wares, set at the base of probably overpriced but hip-looking lofts with full-wall windows. None of which was there, I'm sure, the last time I strolled through this area. I was just going to Safeway then, and don't even recall offhand what I was doing in the area, but back then the place seemed quite a bit more...dilapidated. 

In any case, it's quite a trendy location now, and has several more establishments of a food nature in the surrounding lines of freshly erected buildings which I might perhaps find some time to explore. Someday.

I eventually found my way back to work, about an hour and a half past the time I had listed on a little post-it note on my door. I...don't think anyone noticed. Or cared. So in the end it's just an anecdote of a story of a day in the life of this guy in his upper-middle-forties.

Oh yeah - the sandwich I indulged in today was the Prosciutto and Chicken on ciabatta bread. Washed down with their Rose Lemonade. Next time, perhaps the steak. And the shop's mascot is a blue cow, emblazoned on their website and immortalized in life-size statue form outside their main entrance. And their slogan? "Where Happy is the Main Ingredient".

Well, it was a happy day with happy company.

 

Back to the Bay

Today I finally scraped together a little time to return to the city of my soul, to San Francisco. It seemed like a long time had passed since I was last there. And it had; it was mid-July the last time I went. Not to be overly dramatic, but hat's an eternity for me! And it was great to be back.

As luck would have it, I stumbled into the middle of Fleet Week. I have this knack, you see, for being completely oblivious to major events going on in the places I travel to. Just lucky I guess. That's how I stumbled upon a Bernie Sanders rally there in 2016. And it's not the first time I've been surprised by a Fleet Week there either. But it's just as well that I knew nothing of it going in, for I surely would have talked myself out of going and just stayed. Which, frankly, would have led to a more productive day, but let's not go there.

As it was, all of the regular parking I normally use was cordoned off for vendors and staff and food trucks and probably dignitaries, if there were any. So I took a little drive and found a nice little parking spot past the base of the Golden Gate, up into the Presidio area, about two miles from Fort Mason. It was a nice little walk back in through Chrissy Field, so I'm not really complaining. But boy was it crowded in Sand Francisco today! It was almost like being at Disneyland, except I didn't get to ride Thunder Mountain. Folks lined the beaches and grassy knolls and just about every free space they could plant down some lawn chairs or beach cabanas. They were there, I imagine primarily, to see the air show. Which was ironic, since the fog never did quite burn off, so no one could really see any planes. But boy, you could hear them. Loud enough to set off varying car alarms. 

So it was not the normal tranquility (relatively speaking) that I found there today. It was still nice though, and I got my 10 miles of walking in, my Nob Hill Chill from Ghirardelli, and even had lunch at a little Mexican joint in the Marina District which I had never been to before. Always great to try someplace new.

One of these days I'm going to have to plan an overnight trip there again.

And I saw the Ruby Princess, again by sheer luck, since she's usually only there once every 10-15 days or so. Thousands of people embarking on a new and exciting journey out into open ocean. And even up in that part of the Embarcadero, there were crowds and crowds of people. And more vendors than usual, too, selling all manor of hats and toys and bacon wrapped hot dogs sizzling on the grill surrounded by beds of onions. Saw a homeless gu steal a couple of those hot dogs too, right off the grill. Fun times. 

All in all it was a fairly uneventful day, but after such a hiatus as I had, it was nice to be back in the fresh ocean air.