Tree gone, better view... Now clean-up time for the rest of stuff growing out of hand...
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| From Santa Cruz with Kent and Jessica |
We walked down the hill for this to the place called Abbey, a fine place and kind of like a reward for the hard work we just did. The Abbey is a newer place here in Santa Cruz, it is located in a church and the "kids" working here look like altar-boys and girls. But the atmosphere is great, and the coffee good, also there is a stage, a band is about ready to play some really loud music too, but were not quite ready to start yet. Lucky for us, that way we could enjoy our coffee and little snack without getting interrupted too many times. Like, once in a while the guitar-player, has to go at it to practice or sound-check but we got out of the place before things got out of hand and headed back home.
The Abbey, coffee-shop in a church... now that's my religion...
A 13 minute walk up a steep hill. Timing-service provided by Jessica and me by request of Kent.
Now is time again to play around on the computers, like writing yesterday's blog and putting a little movie together about the tree in the front-yard that had to be removed. Kent shot a bunch of pictures during the process and now he is making a slideshow out of these pictures with some great music. I'll post it here soon.
Time to eat once more while in the hands of a former chef, we warmed-up the soup from yesterday and I had a toast with that. The soup might tastes even better that the day before, you know how that goes, some dishes taste much better as the age.
So, I offered to pick Pei and Chris up from the airport, they are coming back from 10 days of Boston and surrounding area, visiting friends and family. Arrival time of their Virgin Atlantic flight was at 9:55 PM, now I'm looking on my computer to see what time it is, and I realize that I better get moving, it is almost 9 PM. Pack-up all my stuff and just after nine I was in the car heading east on 17. Over the hill, 85 east to 280 north, then 92 to 101 to the San Francisco International Airport, 65 miles and I have less than a hour to get there... ohh well, Chris and Pei have to get the luggage and I guess a bit of wait to breath the fresh air might not be a bad thing after all. I get there, it is just 20 past 10, not bad, so were many other cars, a long line of cars trying to pick-up folks form the different terminals. Chris has not called me yet, that means they haven't landed yet and so I take the slow way to make the round through all the domestic terminal, but dang darn it, where is the Virgin Atlantic deal... I ended up back outside of the airport and then decided to park in the short term parking-garage of the domestic terminals to go inside to find out about it. I'm walking into the domestic terminal 1 to see where I can find the Virgin Atlantic counter. Come to find out that they are in the international terminal. So I walk over there and it takes me quite some time to find out where they will come out. Now it is 10:40 and I see on the screen that the flight will be in at 10:40... perfect timing once more.
The direction thing is really badly designed, it really isn't clear to me where to go and I don't think I'm a dummy, I've been to many airports in this country and found my way around with no problems, but that Virgin Atlantic and also Jet Blue are in the international terminal and then, hidden away from all the other international arrival, is really not logical. I actually ask 2 people on where the place is to meet the people form these flights. Okay, I'm here now, find a seat with a clear view to the door where the domesticated travelers will pop-out. The screen still indicates that the VA flight from Boston is arriving at 10:40 Terminal A??? Now where in the hell is Terminal "A", I can't find it on the site-plan of the airport, maybe I looked at an old one.
I have my book, Kitchen Confidential, which I'm already loving like crazy and can't wait to continue, and so I read. Time goes by and I strike-up a conversation with the lady sitting next to me because she keeps on checking on the flight status. Her husband is in the same flight as Pei and Chris, she flew with United from Boston and is here waiting for the longest time for him to arrive too, even though their flights were supposed to land at about the same time. I not even remember what time it was when Chris finally called that they have landed. But I know about it because phone were ringing from a few other people around me, including the women next to me. I tell Chris where I am waiting for them and it took forever until finally people popped out of that door... no sighting of my friends until the phone rings again and it was Chris asking me where I was waiting because they are almost at the luggage-claim area... too strange but I did not see them, obviously!!!
They get the luggage and we have a long hike ahead of us to get back to my car, again I was completely lost in finding the way back to the domestic terminal... bad design, no signs and again I had to ask...
Finally at about midnight we're leaving the parking after unloading 10 bucks for the parking fee to get the gate opened. Then back to 101 north and next thing is that I'm realizing how low the car is on gas. I thought about it as I was driving to the airport, but thought that I had to hurry and that I can gas up later, I should not have thought... I could not really finish that thought when the car started to loose power and we stranded on the small service-lane just after the Candlestick right before 3rd Street exit, on an uphill section of the freeway, no coasting to the next gas-station, as I have done before. Now what, for Pei and Chris it is now quarter past 3 east-coast time, Chris has to get-up and to work at 4 california time... well I guess we first laughed a bit but then got serious, Chris calls AAA road-assistance and I was embarrassed I could have just sink into the ground. How can that happen... I did forget to reset the trip-meter to know when I get close to the 300 mile range the Honda has with a full tank, then the needle hits ground zero very early and I know I can a couple of dozen miles before a disaster like that happens. Here we are, it's drizzling, cold and kind of freaky to be on the side of the freeway with very little room. I start reading them from the "Kitchen Confidential" book, the section I was just reading in the airport while waiting for them. I like the way this guy writes, how eating his first oyster changed his life forever and the way he compared it with many "first" things in his life.
The tow-truck with some gas should be here in 45 minutes and it took Chris many attempts to explain where exactly we are. About 45 minutes later a CHP (California Highway Patrol) finally shows up and pushes us a few hundred feet forward to a bigger spot, during this time the tow-truck-driver calls us too and ask where we are and that guy was an exit too early. We watch his lights cross the bridge in front of us but he had to go back onto 101 to the next exit south of us to get back on 101 north to get behind us... ohh what a drag!!!
Some paper-work and 5 bucks for 2 gallon of gas and off we go, boy oh boy I'm so embarrassed!!! Pei and Chris might never ask me again to pick them up from any airport...
It is 1:30 in the morning when I finally got into my house... what a night!!!
In the morning the time flies, no doubt about about that... tinkering around the house, making phone-calls, write stuff like this and wait for lunch to come around the corner, but I think I missed that one too and also the 3 o'clock passes me unnoticed.... and yet I had coffee way before noon, but so it goes sometimes!!!
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